Open Forum: March 9, 2013 at Catallaxy Files

Open Forum: March 9, 2013

995 comments

Written by Sinclair Davidson

March 9th, 2013 at 12:01 am

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995 Responses to 'Open Forum: March 9, 2013'

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Here she comes,

You’d better watch your step

Rabz

9 Mar 13 at 12:01 am
Rabz is a lucky bastard.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 12:08 am
Ah, so this is what Bolt was alluding to:

AN email obtained exclusively by The Weekend Australian reveals Julia Gillard’s partner, Tim Mathieson, sought to involve her office in pressuring a major sporting club to freeze out Tony Abbott.

After attending an AFL clash at the MCG as a guest of the Richmond Football Club, Mr Mathieson emailed its chief executive, Brendon Gale, copying in the Prime Minister’s office, to complain about the Opposition Leader’s access to the team’s inner sanctum and his prominent seating at a pre-game function.

Mr Mathieson demanded that Mr Gale raise the matter with the Prime Minister’s chief of staff, Ben Hubbard.

His fiery outburst occurred on a Sunday evening after the Dreamtime AFL match between Essendon and Richmond on May 19 last year. The Dreamtime game is one of the highlights of the AFL calendar for its social and cultural significance in promoting reconciliation.

“Mate u need to speak with Ben Hubbard on why abboott was taken down to the rooms … ” Mr Mathieson fumed. ” … it’s just not on Who authorised it < it was a shocker it was a Don's function and he should not have gone down there

What a nasty piece of work. And very childish.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/tim-mathieson-pressured-richmond-to-snub-tony-abbott/story-fn59niix-1226593598167

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:08 am
Richmond has accommodated Mr Mathieson’s requests for tickets, hospitality and memorabilia since his move into The Lodge.

At the Dreamtime game in Melbourne, the first bloke invited ABC Insiders host Barrie Cassidy to join him on the Richmond table. Both men visited the Richmond room before the contest, where they crossed paths with Mr Abbott, who was a guest of Essendon’s chairman David Evans.

Essendon was hosting the pre-game function for the Dreamtime game and in charge of protocol. The Opposition Leader was accompanied to the event by two of his three daughters and his chief of staff, Peta Credlin.

The rooms for rival teams at the MCG are not far apart and after visiting Essendon players, Mr Abbott was escorted across to the Richmond bunker.

Clubs embrace politicians from all sides of politics and dignitaries who are invited to pre-game functions usually get taken to visit players in the room before the match.

The Weekend Australian understands that Mr Gale responded politely to Mr Mathieson’s email protest, explaining that Richmond was staunchly bipartisan and happy to accord Mr Abbott the very same privileges that the Prime Minister’s partner enjoyed on a regular basis. He signed off by confirming Mr Mathieson’s attendance at an upcoming pre-game cocktail, party in Sydney.

Mr Gale would not comment on the email exchange. “He will not discuss private communications,” his spokesman said.

Government sources say Mr Mathieson has a habit of firing off emails and texts to Ms Gillard’s personal staff when he senses a perceived injustice. His email to Mr Gale was copied to a senior public servant working in Ms Gillard’s office at the time.

Let the mocking commence!

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:10 am
Fifth

Fourth really, ‘coz Gab went twice!

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:11 am
Dullard’s partner, Dim Mathieson, sought to involve her office in pressuring a major sporting club to freeze out Tony Abbott.

So – not just as thick as a housebrick and lazy as a sloth, but with a totally unearned sense of entitlement as well.

I’m shocked, shocked, I tells ya!

Rabz

9 Mar 13 at 12:14 am
So who leaked? Is itthe Ruddster again?

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:15 am
Not a sense of entitlement so much as a sense of grievance, I suspect. He would have the constant sneaking suspicion (well founded) that everyone he meets regards him as a joke.

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:17 am
Well so far I have heard that the brisbane gunman has a history of mental health issues, is linked to a bike gang and was due in court today ona domestic matter.

I think that’s enough to claim my prediction that he would be a mental health patient using drugs who has domestic issues.

brc

9 Mar 13 at 12:18 am
Tim Mathieson: Blokezilla.

What man carries on like that? Throwing a hissy fit and running to his girlfriend for help?

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:20 am
So who leaked? Is it the Ruddster again?

The Mole™ confirmed today that ruff has 52 – not 50, but 52, I tells ya!

The Ides of March nears.

Rabz

9 Mar 13 at 12:22 am
I get the feeling Mathewson is in it for the perks. I’m to totally convinced that this is not a show romance. I give it one year past the end of the pmship, max.

I seriously think Gillard sees herself as a permanent spinster and only took up a bloke as part of preparing a run at the top job. That’s why no marriage, because she does nt and has never believed in it.

brc

9 Mar 13 at 12:22 am
So who leaked? Is itthe Ruddster again?

Don’t know but I’d shout the whistle-blower a couple of drinks.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:22 am
“Richmond has accommodated Mr Mathieson’s requests for tickets, hospitality and memorabilia since his move into The Lodge.”

Entitlement whore.

“At the Dreamtime game in Melbourne, the first bloke invited ABC Insiders host Barrie Cassidy to join him on the Richmond table.”

Journolist.

Chicagoland all over.

Mark

9 Mar 13 at 12:25 am
Don’t know but I’d shout the whistle-blower a couple of drinks.

Not if it’s Rudd, not even if he’s on fire.

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:26 am
I don’t mind the cheesy little man, Cato. As long as he never ever gets into power again, that is.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:28 am
Chicagoland all over

But certainly. How else will we know how important he is unless he goes to important places and does important things with important people who listen when he talks importantly to them?

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:29 am
On what the third person here said, and the third person too, Mathieson oughta pull his head in.

He’s getting to go to places and events he could only have dreamed of back when he was a hairdresser using someone else’s money to buy the scissors, Brylcreem and Man, Pix and Post magazines. He wouldn’t be attending any of them but for people who feel obliged to invite him because of her.

He’ll soon be be a great example of “Be nice to people on the way up because it is certain you may need to rely on some of ‘em on the way back down.”

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 12:29 am
He’s not a cheesy little man, he’s a vicious vindictive small minded vengeful narcissistic bastard, universally despised by everyone who has ever worked with or for him

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:31 am
I seem to remember Brendon Gale being a dyed in the wool socialist in the Billy Bragg mould in his playing days. At least he has enough principles to give both parties the same treatment.

Or perhaps he had a change of heart somewhere in the last 15 years, now that he’s one of the shiny arses.

Yobbo

9 Mar 13 at 12:32 am
Oh I see The Sinclair has a post up on the Blokezilla matter.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:32 am
I seriously think Gillard sees herself as a permanent spinster and only took up a bloke as part of preparing a run at the top job.

Which explains why she didn’t even bother to manacle anyone other than a vegetable for the possible duration.

It’s just so frigging typical of labor – Lardarse demands a suitable ready made boyfriend and the pardee machine functionaries enlist the dimster for the prime spinster.

They simply can’t get anything right.

Six years of profound national shame.

So how’s that ‘fiscal conservatism’ working out for ya’ll again?

Rabz

9 Mar 13 at 12:33 am
So, your not fussed about him then, Cato? You could go one way or the other, I see.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 12:33 am
Let the mocking commence!

It’s a goldmine Gab, a goddmaned goldmine.

Here he is in a pathetic fluff piece from 2010. Remember when the media all decided to trot him out with Gillard to make them look like a “normal” couple?

Tim’s own words after rabbiting on about what a wonderful hairdresser he is:

“But I also enjoy my time with my mates, my alpha buddies, fishing and going up the country.

“Alpha” buddies?

What.the.fuck.

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 12:39 am
You could go one way or the other, I see.

Sure, crucifixion or immolation, I don’t mind.

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:39 am
link: http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/salon-romance-now-a-national-affair/story-e6frf7jo-1225884003554

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 12:40 am
That’s really gross.

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 12:44 am
“my alpha buddies” is right up there with Comrade Dear Leader (in exile)’s “fair shake of the sauce bottle”.

Mick Young would turn in his grave at what Labor puts forward as “blokes” now.

“my alpha buddies”? Unbelievable.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 12:48 am
To find the really Tim we need to go back to 2007, to a time before Gillard had the media barracking for her and the PMO’s office to spin reality as she sees fit:

Gillard furious at attack on partner

It is claimed her partner, hair products salesman Tim Mathieson, bombarded a Shepparton woman with hundreds of insulting text messages.

And it is claimed Mr Mathieson has admitted to a drink-drive smash, fathering a child as a teen and walking out on a hair salon in which his father invested $30,000.

He confirmed walking out on a Shepparton hairdressing business about two years ago, about 12 months after his family helped him set it up.

Mr Mathieson said his father put $30,000 into the business and he and his brother, John, borrowed the other $50,000 in a partnership.

“We dissolved the partnership and I came back to Melbourne and he took over the debt,” Mr Mathieson said.

“He took my half of the debt. It was something my brother and his wife wanted to do.

And the most interesting paragraph:

Gillard and Mathieson revealed their relationship 18 months ago, after criticism of her leadership prospects as an unmarried, childless woman.

Well, well, well.

Timmy seems to be a bit of a cad.

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/gillard-furious-at-attack/story-e6frf7l6-1111114636780

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 12:52 am
NBN favouring western Sydney:

NBN not favouring Western Sydney: Conroy.

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 12:56 am
“We dissolved the partnership and I came back to Melbourne and he took over the debt,” Mr Mathieson said.

What a man.

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 12:58 am
I seriously think Gillard sees herself as a permanent spinster and only took up a bloke as part of preparing a run at the top job.

….

DT 2007:

Gillard and Mathieson revealed their relationship 18 months ago, after criticism of her leadership prospects as an unmarried, childless woman

How embarrassment these clowns are.

Should we link to CL’s favourite Zoo Magazine front page model to round the night off?

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 1:00 am
Should we link to CL’s favourite Zoo Magazine front page model to round the night off?

No, we shouldn’t.

Rabz

9 Mar 13 at 1:03 am
Not if it’s Rudd, not even if he’s on fire.

Oh come on, not even something pure enough to burn?

I also enjoy my time with my mates, my alpha buddies, fishing and going up the country.

Thus telegraphing that he’s something other than they are? Seriously, all he had to do was to tell us he goes fishing etc. with his mates.

perturbed

9 Mar 13 at 1:04 am
Oh come on, not even something pure enough to burn?

Nope, slow is better.

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 1:07 am
No, we shouldn’t.

Hey remember when Gillard looked like a nanna?

—————
No seriously she used to look like a nanna:
http://resources1.news.com.au/images/2007/10/13/va1237271983670/gillard-5700876.jpg

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 1:09 am
He really is such a dumb conroy.

James Madden in The Australian yesterday:

AN ABC journalist has been disciplined by the broadcaster’s management over concerns that his online posts about the National Broadband Network failed to meet its “standards of objective journalism”.

Nick Ross, who edits a forum on the ABC website that focuses on technology and games issues, has written a series of favourable articles about the NBN recently. He has been highly critical of the Coalition’s opposition to the $37.4 billion project.
…

How very dare they, the dreadful brutes. Stephen Conroy fuming with Jon Faine on ABC 774:

CONROY: There now seems to be a policy of trying to intimidate ABC personnel. Malcolm Turnbull is constantly attacking and trying to bully some of your journalists [makes a change from Labor pollies doing it]. And today I read in The Australian, and I know you shouldn’t always believe everything you read in The Australian, but a very disturbing thing where another journalist on the ABC staff has been internally disciplined because they’re not prepared to just accept every policy pronouncement or claim that’s made publicly [really? I think the ABC faithfully reproduce the talking points memos sent to them from you and your mob]. Now this cannot go on. These internal procedures of the ABC have to be more open and more transparent. Journalists cannot work on a basis that they’re going to be bullied and intimidated, and have complaints lodged against them in a process that is not transparent and open. This is the second …

Faine: Well, now, by way of background, the ABC has disciplined one of its editors, a man called Nick Ross, who edits a forum on the ABC’s online publications, who has been critical of the Coalition. Mr Ross has been critical of the Coalition’s broadband policy, and supportive of yours. And it’s been determined by the ABC internal complaints process that his reporting has not been even-handed.

Conroy: Well, while I don’t agree with all of Nick Ross’s findings, he’s not someone I’ve ever met, except for I think at press conferences. I don’t agree with everything that Nick Ross writes in his columns. But what he’s been prepared to do is compare policies, now that is the job of journalists. To be prepared …

Faine: No, he’s been accused of being part of your fan club.

Thick as.

Cut&Paste.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 1:17 am
Tim Mathieson, Commonwealth wife:

http://resources0.news.com.au/images/2011/10/28/1226179/994664-chogm.jpg

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 1:18 am
“Gillard furious”

I always enjoy seeing that headline (in twostix’ link).

She had the broadsheet editors run it when she demanded they sack a couple of journos rather than have them call her for the cheap con job that she is. The gutless bastards let her get away with it too, instead of simply saying “Pith off you smelly little tart, stop wasting my time.”

So what if she’s “furious” I say, she’s no-one – a mere spiv and urger, grubbing about in the mildew and rotting food scraps getting even with similar touts from her own side. I see her and think of the back streets off Darlinghurst Road at the Cross, where the human debris shuffles about in the half light.

“I know politics can be a dirty game, but this is reaching a new low,” the link says she says. It’s skanks like her that bring the grime and the stale smell of the gutter with them, to fashion public service into a “dirty game” in their own image.

What a useless, deplorable woman she is.

Died of shame? If he didn’t he bloody well should have.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 1:25 am
There now seems to be a policy of trying to intimidate ABC personnel.

THE Australian Press Council and News Limited are doing a better job today than they were six months ago but that doesn’t necessarily mean there’s no longer the need for a beefed-up media regulator, federal Communications Minister Stephen Conroy says.

Senator Conroy was also sounding more conciliatory when it came to News Limited, which he believes has unfairly campaigned against Labor.

“I think there’s been a better balance over the last few months,” the minister said.

That was partly due to fact the press council had ruled against The Daily Telegraph regarding its coverage of the national broadband network, Senator Conroy said.

What an utter scumbag.

After two years of all out war against News Ltd he whinges that the ABC found one of its own was barracking for Labor and told them to stop.

Scum.

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 1:27 am
Not intimidation:

“I presume you know why I’m calling,” the Prime Minister said.

Hartigan, chairman and chief executive of News Limited, had no idea. He soon did, as the Prime Minister voiced her displeasure at the publication that morning in The Australian of a column by Glenn Milne, which revived 16-year-old allegations about Gillard’s one-time relationship with former unionist Bruce Wilson.

According to Hartigan, Gillard put a series of demands that she wanted addressed in 15 minutes.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/am-call-that-put-pms-old-news-on-front-page/story-fn59niix-1226128513341

twostix

9 Mar 13 at 1:33 am
” “I think there’s been a better balance over the last few months,” the minister said.”

Conroy wouldn’t recognise balance if it kicked him in the nuts.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 1:37 am
3 weeks

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 1:45 am
Dismissive, are you ever going to explain your cryptic messages?

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 1:51 am
Yes

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 1:53 am
In three weeks?

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 1:53 am
No, that would be too late.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 1:54 am
Okay, when, enigmatic one?

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 1:56 am
dismissive – loving your work.

wet paint.

600 billion stars in the sky.

Sinclair Davidson

9 Mar 13 at 1:57 am
If I plan it well and actually remember, (a more difficult task) then 28/3 or thereabouts.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 1:58 am
Sinclair, sadly for the philosophical it is a “thing”. Nonetheless I appreciate the note.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 2:00 am
wet paint.

600 billion stars in the sky.

I don’t get it.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:01 am
John Neville Keynes made the argument that if you claimed there were 600 billion stars in the sky people would believe you. But if you were to place a sign saying ‘wet paint’ people will test that proposition by touching the surface.

Sinclair Davidson

9 Mar 13 at 2:06 am
Thank you, Sinclair. Sounds like JNK was related to JMK. I can make argument against what JNKeynes said but it’s late and the caffeine is finally wearing off.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:09 am
600 Billion is too high to count but wet paint is testable

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 2:10 am
BTW, it very odd to see you here this late at night, Sinclair, not usual for you. Just sayin’.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:10 am
A “thing”? Hmmmm. Part two of season seven of Doctor Who? Season three of Game of Thrones? The Australian release of Weeds season season? The next Alistair Reynolds novel? Apparently a third Doctor Who story and not the second Poseidon’s Children novel. Very annoying.

Sinclair Davidson

9 Mar 13 at 2:10 am
JNK was related to JMK

Father and son.

it very odd to see you here this late at night, Sinclair, not usual for you.

Mrs D is in Hong Kong on business. I am naturally a late night person but go to bed early when Mrs D is at home.

Sinclair Davidson

9 Mar 13 at 2:13 am
“3 weeks”

is immediately after both Houses complete sitting in Canberra, to reconvene not until the Budget session 7 weeks later (May 14).

I do not believe the slovenly tart can survive until May, or that she can survive her and Swan’s financial denouement then. There are tiny shifts of opinion now evident from a small number of journalists, with each article shooting a poison dart into her rotting carcase.

I believe the justifiably panic stricken soon-to-be-Centrelinker backbenchers and ministers will make some move on her in two weeks and that, about then, Robert McClelland will be appointed to that NSW industrial commissioner/judge role, with attendant further damage.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 2:13 am
Human behaviour not something the Keynes household was bothered with then.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:17 am
Oooops – I forgot to add that any move in the party room will involve irrational and precipitous (because there is nowhere or no-one better to go on to) and not necessarily successful, which I do hope for.

I want to see her go the full distance and unravel little by little until then.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 2:21 am
WA election to be close then….

COLIN Barnett has finished the West Australian election campaign in a near-unbeatable position, with a surge of voter support expected to bring him a second term in office and strip Labor of almost half of its seats.

The Premier and his Liberal-Nationals Coalition go to the polls today with a two-party-preferred lead over Labor of 59.5 per cent to 40.5 per cent, which would see them returned with an increased majority, according to a Newspoll conducted exclusively for The Weekend Australian this week.

tbh

9 Mar 13 at 2:26 am
Isn’t it great how gillard stayed away from WA and kept a low profile before the election tomorrow.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:33 am
Wonderful, isn’t it, Gab. I can hardly wait for the federal election. AbbottAbbottAbbott will get enough frequent flier miles to send him round the world a few times, and Gillard will be circulating round a few backward Victorian electorates (with perhaps a daring trip to Tasmania?)

Squawkbox

9 Mar 13 at 2:36 am
I can hardly wait for the federal election

Heard similar remarks from the folks in western Sydney. Like kids counting down to Christmas Day.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:41 am
In the planted promotional puff pieces not-an-election-campaign department:

“WHEN Finance Minister Penny Wong is in the garden with her daughter Alexandra …” (today’s Telegraph)

That Wong chap is not a parent, the child is not “her daughter”. To describe this farce so simply ships me.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

9 Mar 13 at 2:46 am
Saw the front cover of the Courier Mail yesterday with Peter Beattie lamenting that he’d left the post and seemingly, us Queenslanders, in the lurch. What chutzpah! Come back Peter, we are waiting, the bitumen’s on the stove and there are several buckets of feathers standing by. Campbell Newman to cut the ribbon on the proceedings; tickets $1000 each.

Denise

9 Mar 13 at 6:05 am
Hahahahahahaha.

PM Julia Gillard to visit Perth – AFTER the election

PRIME Minister Julia Gillard will take her ministers to Perth’s outer suburbs later this month for a community cabinet meeting.

The host suburb of Thornlie lies in the seat of Hasluck, the Liberals’ most marginal seat in the country.

It is held by the only indigenous member of the House of Representatives, Ken Wyatt, by a margin of 0.6 per cent.

The March 27 event will include ministerial meetings and a one-hour public forum.

She’s flying all the way over here for THAT?

To try to kick the nation’s first and only Indigenous person elected to the House of Representatives out of his seat?

Racist bitch.

Hahahahahahahaha!

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 6:56 am
69th!

Cold-Hands

9 Mar 13 at 7:29 am
I’m expecting the Cat’s finest western wits to give us full coverage of the day’s splendid tidings:

Some Liberal MPs are confident of a swing that could deliver the Government as many as 30 of 59 seats in the Legislative Assembly.

While sources within the Liberals’ campaign headquarters were quick to hose down those expectations, senior MPs were confident the party would hold Morley and win Albany, Forrestfield and Balcatta from Labor.

They were also optimistic the rural seat of Collie-Preston could be wrested from the grasp of veteran Labor incumbent Mick Murray.

Today’s Newspoll has the Government winning 59.5 per cent of the vote to Labor’s 40.5 per cent on a two-party preferred basis.

That would return the Premier with an increased majority.

Labor party internal tracking has projected it would win some-where between 20 and 26 seats, with its campaigners fearing that the final result would be at the lower end of the range.

It’s just a pity Perth businesses can’t operate in the Australian economy on account of the government deciding to put the clock back 30 years in summer.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 7:34 am
Reposting from the old fred.

Blinder is about rape and loss of innocence. It is — or rather, it should have been — about how the stains of some crimes, moral or legal, can never be wiped away no matter how hard you scrub at them. Moments in life when you realise the only way to move forward is to be contrite. To acknowledge you’ve made a mistake.

Still reading down the thread and I come to Tom’s link to the Crikey “review”.

Just on principle I want to go and pay at the cinema for this film even if I’m not interested in watching it.

This review also demonstrates how thoroughly intolerant the Leftards are. Ever heard of words like “forgiveness” and “mercy”?

Nah, didn’t think so.

nilk

9 Mar 13 at 8:06 am
If you’re an off-the-beaten-track type, put this on your list of must-see places: Graham Lloyd has a piece and a short video in today’s Oz about the “Lost Cities”, a spectacular sandstone formation on the western side of the Gulf of Carpentaria about 50 kms north-west of Boroloola, NT.

I read that it’s finally been made a national park. In the 1980s, I was one of few whites to visit the Los Cities, which the local blackfellahs called “Devil Devil Country”, by helicopter. It scared the hell out of the locals because the tops of the rock pillars look awfully like human heads. They make the Bungle Bungles look boring.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 8:34 am
Newspoll predicting a Landslide in WA LIB 59.5 ALP 40.5

Emily’s list is backing their candidates as well.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/BE3SMt2CcAA01Me.jpg

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 8:39 am
Some technical stuff about the “doping” substance at the heart of the crisis that is destroying the Cronulla Sharks and potentially other clubs and other sports.

Poor Old Rafe

9 Mar 13 at 8:41 am
It’s just a pity Perth businesses can’t operate in the Australian economy on account of the government deciding to put the clock back 30 years in summer.

Sorry, mate. Given the chance to stay in sync with our Asian business and trading partners in summer, we’ll happily piss off the Eastern States mendicants.

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 8:45 am
Judith’s piece on Gonski, which is very good.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/opinion/textbook-case-of-rushing-in-with-fools-cap-in-hand/story-e6frg6zo-1226593332215

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 8:59 am
Don’t blame you, Dawg. It’s just that I’ve heard Perth business complaining that, in summer, the eastern states are already on their lunch break by the time they get to the office.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 9:01 am
To make them less boring and more relevant, the Bungle Bungles could be reshaped in the way Mount Rushmore was, but with current Labor members’ heads atop them.

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 9:01 am
I’ve heard Perth business complaining that, in summer, the eastern states are already on their lunch break by the time they get to the office.

Meh. Complaints like that don’t move me. Somehow the East & West Coast of the USA manage to deal with having a 3-hour time difference – and without all the whinging. Are Perthlings really less capable than Californians?

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 9:12 am
the Bungle Bungles could be reshaped in the way Mount Rushmore was, but with current Labor members’ heads atop them

Sorry – no Labor icons allowed in WA come the secession.

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 9:15 am
CanDo provides further guidance to Abbott and Co on how to clean out the Labor-appointed public service luvvies:

THE embattled head of Queensland’s Misconduct Commission quit dramatically last night, after Premier Campbell Newman called for him to consider resigning over the botched declassification of secret intelligence files from the game-changing Fitzgerald corruption inquiry.

But Ross Martin SC insisted he was resigning for health reasons, in a surprise development in the crisis that has caused the most serious rupture between the state government and its official anti-corruption watchdog since Queensland public life was turned upside down 25 years ago by the Fitzgerald findings of systemic police and political corruption.
…
After acting reluctantly on a request by the CMC to suppress the files’ publication, through emergency legislation that was rushed through state parliament in the early hours yesterday, Mr Newman ramped up pressure on Mr Martin to take responsibility for the blunder and “consider” resigning.

Mr Martin had presided over a “pattern” of lack of openness, accountability and respect for the Queensland parliament, the Premier said. “Frankly, I’ve had ministers that have been prepared to resign because they’ve actually failed the test as well,” he said.

“And if they’ve failed the test on matters that are almost trivial compared to Mr Martin’s lack of good governance and accountability, then he should consider doing the same thing.”

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 9:20 am
Tim Mathieson: Blokezilla.

What man carries on like that? Throwing a hissy fit and running to his girlfriend for help?

Gab, he is a hairdresser – just sayin

Helen Armstrong

9 Mar 13 at 9:33 am
Mmmmm…

In a case of apparent plagiarism, Fox News pundit [and Obama lapdog] Juan Williams lifted — sometimes word for word — from a Center for American Progress report, without ever attributing the information, for a column he wrote last month for the Hill newspaper.

Almost two weeks after publication, the column was quietly revised online, with many of the sections rewritten or put in quotation marks, and this time citing the CAP report. It also included an editor’s note that read: “This column was revised on March 2, 2013, to include previously-omitted attribution to the Center for American Progress.”

But that editor’s note mentions only the attribution problem, and not the nearly identical wording that was also fixed.

In a phone interview Thursday evening, Williams pinned the blame on a researcher who he described as a “young man.”

“I was writing a column about the immigration debate and had my researcher look around to see what data existed to pump up this argument and he sent back what I thought were his words and summaries of the data,” Williams told Salon. “I had never seen the CAP report myself, so I didn’t know that the young man had in fact not summarized the data but had taken some of the language from the CAP report.”

Bad business, that. But it helps to have a hapless “young researcher” handy to throw under the bus, I guess. A lesson for all of us.

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 9:34 am
Maybe bipartisanship is not something that exists as a concept anywhere in his life. Thus he would feel betrayed if anyone was not completely aligned with his own little leftard world

WhaleHunt Fun

9 Mar 13 at 9:39 am
Sdog,
There are eastern states? Why?

Woolfe

9 Mar 13 at 9:45 am
Laurie Ooks seems unimpressed with Abbott today. Sprays BS about illegals being compared with pedophiles by the opposition when it was a comparison made by one of his mates which Abetz denied.
We’ll have fun with that bloated one after September when we get back into the full fun of whalehunting

WhaleHunt Fun

9 Mar 13 at 9:47 am
The Eastern states exist to provide the coal to turn your iron ore into iron.
Beyond that there are bananas and…. well there are bananas.

WhaleHunt Fun

9 Mar 13 at 9:49 am
And they keep NZ away from you

WhaleHunt Fun

9 Mar 13 at 9:50 am
And they take all the illegals so when they go on sexual assault outings to relieve the boredom, they’re not molesting your women.

WhaleHunt Fun

9 Mar 13 at 9:51 am
We don’t send anything to the East, just rocks to China that contain 60% Fe. Good job if you can get it.

Oh, and too late with NZ, fair percentage of working populations seems to be over here!

Woolfe

9 Mar 13 at 9:53 am
Sorry, yea see your point about the coal, and the bananas!

Woolfe

9 Mar 13 at 9:56 am
There are eastern states? Why?

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 9:57 am
Obamas and Clintons share intimate dinner

“WASHINGTON’S political rumour mill is buzzing with news that President Barack Obama and his wife Michelle hosted an intimate White House dinner with Bill and Hillary Clinton.”

perhaps the conversation went something like this..

Will

9 Mar 13 at 10:10 am
Fairfax readers – the ones I’ve spoken to – hate the new format. They claim that not only have they changed the layout but they’ve used that as an excuse to shorten the stories and produce less content.

These loyal Fairfax readers are switching to the Australian or stopping altogether.

Is Fairfax deliberately scaling down their operations? This is what happens when the people with skin in the game (the shareholders) don’t have a say in how the company is run.

dd

9 Mar 13 at 10:12 am
Gillard should take her upcoming western safari of fail to the Bungle Bungles.

The appropriateness would be epic.

And well spotted, er, Spot.

Gillard and her entire cabinet heading to the seat of Parliament’s sole Aborigine.

Nice optics. Who’s bringing the rope?

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 10:12 am
We linked to that claim by US astroturf ‘abuse rights’ perverts earlier in the week, Jeff.

Interesting that an American group has a black at number 1 on their lynching list.

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 10:15 am
To make them less boring and more relevant, the Bungle Bungles could be reshaped in the way Mount Rushmore was, but with current Labor members’ heads atop them.

They’d then have to be renamed the Incompetent Incompetents.

kae

9 Mar 13 at 10:23 am
Anyone up for some drinking games with WA votes tonight? I might be trialling my ‘down a drink per seat lost’ for September 14

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 10:28 am
Dear Mr I Tiger

I presument that this is your Brumby? I’ll give you $2k for it, on the condition that we load it up with WACATS, drive it up the Gunbarrel to the Rock, then torch it in the Yulara carpark as we fly home. A decent ceremony for a good ute.

IT’s Rice Rocket.

Pickles

9 Mar 13 at 10:29 am
… or just The Bunglers.

kae

9 Mar 13 at 10:30 am
It is going to be another tough night for Kerry O’Brien and the ABC when covering the WA election tonight. I think he might be retiring after September 14.

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 10:31 am
Gillard and her entire cabinet heading to the seat of Parliament’s sole Aborigine.

Nice optics. Who’s bringing the rope?

It’s beautiful in its ugliness.

sdog

9 Mar 13 at 10:32 am
Some things do not change, as this Pryor cartoon from the Hawke-Keating era shows.

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 10:38 am
Construction declines for 33rd straight month

I have no clue as to why this tragic and unprecedented (?) situation is almost totally ignored.
The construction industry represents infrastructure growth or lack of ( a very important indicator in the economy )
A mammoth in the employment sector ( around %10 )
Huge chunk of GDP.
Yet it’s a non issue in an election year.
The construction industry isn’t the union cesspit it was 20 years ago, it,s a small/medium business domain now.
Why would the LNP not scream bloody murder?

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 10:38 am
And here’s another one, on the subject of a Treasurer creatively presenting a budget deficit.

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 10:42 am
The hospitals story hasn’t changed much since the 1980s either!

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 10:44 am
Construction declines for 33rd straight month

Depends… if it’s the result of government wasting less money on toilet blocks, then it’s no biggie.

Fleeced

9 Mar 13 at 10:48 am
Oh my. I have just learned from Fauxfacts that “rising obesity costs Australia $120 billion a year”. Intrigued by this provocative headline, I made the mistake of clicking on the article, and what do we find?

“The cost of obesity to Australia’s collective wellbeing has reached $120 billion a year – the equivalent of about 8 per cent of the economy’s annual output.
[snip]
Official economic figures only pick up the direct economic effects of obesity, such as absenteeism due to obesity-related illnesses. But obese people feel worse about themselves, on average, because of their weight and the Herald-Lateral Economics index puts a dollar figure on these non-economic – but very significant – effects.
Index author Nicholas Gruen said halving Australia’s obesity rate would be akin to making several major economic reforms.”

He is out of his mind. If you want a quick lesson on how to make up an “index” to prove anything you want, hold your nose and read this article.

High school economics fail for young Nicholas, whose Wiki page describes him as a ‘prominent Australian economist.’

johanna

9 Mar 13 at 10:49 am
Depends… if it’s the result of government wasting less money on toilet blocks, then it’s no biggie.

I suspect Govt spending in this area has risen yet private and corporate has nosedived.
Red/green tape and ridiculous OHnS and insurance costs need addressing first.
2nd material and transport costs.
Then look at pay and conditions.

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 11:06 am
“The cost of obesity to Australia’s collective wellbeing has reached $120 billion a year – the equivalent of about 8 per cent of the economy’s annual output.

First they came for smokers and I said nothing.
Then they came for free speecher’s and I said nothing.
Then they came for happily married family men who do community service and I said nothing.
Now they are gunning for fat fuck’s it’s time to speak out.

Splatacrobat

9 Mar 13 at 11:24 am
I suspect Govt spending in this area has risen yet private and corporate has nosedived.

I hope you’re wrong about that. Alas, one crowds out the other… so with the stimulus we got lots of non-productive production(!). Paying people to dig holes and fill them in again will show up as positive GDP, but we all know it isn’t “real” growth (well, except people like SfB – though I suspect even he knows it, but just pretends otherwise)

Fleeced

9 Mar 13 at 11:27 am
Now they are gunning for fat fuck’s it’s time to speak out.

I’ll do it this afternoon, I swear!

Fleeced

9 Mar 13 at 11:28 am
“The cost of obesity to Australia’s collective wellbeing has reached $120 billion a year – the equivalent of about 8 per cent of the economy’s annual output.

Wayne Swan will be trying to figure out how he can tap into this $120 billion to help him balance his books and save fat people from themselves.

Look out for a fat tax in May as it will be one of the last “finding money behind the couch” ideas he will have before getting kicked out..

Splatacrobat

9 Mar 13 at 11:30 am
Now they are gunning for fat fuck’s it’s time to speak out.

I forgot to add….right after I have this donut, signed Monty.

Splatacrobat

9 Mar 13 at 11:32 am
Since when did a business become liable for thefts by its customers?

In the Glorious People’s Democratic Republic of the ACT, shop owners are liable for fines of $112 for each of their shopping trolleys found outside a designated shopping precinct.

So if a customer steals a trolley and then dumps it, it’s the retailer’s fault.

I just don’t understand how these people think. They are perhaps, as someone suggested above, pod-people.

johanna

9 Mar 13 at 11:33 am
The cost of obesity

But don’t they think we can consume our way out of a recession?

Ellen of Tasmania

9 Mar 13 at 11:39 am
I hope you’re wrong about that. Alas, one crowds out the other

The ” crowd out ” only happens the one way.
The stimulus was handled by idiots with no idea of commerce or business. In the BER the principle contracts were allotted not tendered for.
This mob cannot grasp the concepts of the tender process that is the foundation of the construction industry.
Anyway, has any other sector suffered 33 consecutive months of contraction?
Thankfully, in QLD, Newman is removing some of the sand that slows the construction industry machine.Hopefully Abbott is watching.

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 11:56 am
Last Nov Colorado made Matijuana legal.

LocalCBS: Drug Testing Company Sees Spike In Children Using Marijuana

“I’ve seen a lot more people just walking down the street smoking (joints),” high school student Irie Johnson said.

“In high school it has kind of gotten out of hand,” student Alaina Tanenbaum said.

Experts say the test results show that children are getting higher than ever with alarming levels of THC, marijuana’s active ingredient, in their bodies.

“A typical kid (is) between 50 and 100 nanograms. Now were seeing these up in the over 500, 700, 800, climbing,” Jo McGuire said

McGuire is in a work group for the state’s marijuana task force. She also works for Conspire, which is based in Colorado Springs.

Conspire now does drug testing in four school districts in El Paso County when students are suspected of being high while on campus. McGuire says 100 to 200 nanograms is typical of someone who recently used pot, or is a steady user who smokes once or twice a week. The 300 to 500 range is a daily user. But high levels of THC on a growing brain is unhealthy, according to McGuire.

“In the past we’ve used the term stoner or fried, and I’m now understanding why we use those terms, because you literally take your brain and you rob it from the ability to fire the way it’s supposed to fire, so your memory is impaired,” McGuire said.

Many of the teens that Conspire is testing, are also drivers, and they say those teens should not be behind the wheel of a car with such high levels of THC.

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 12:02 pm
JamesK
Internet use is bad for your health too.
Ban it ?

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 12:14 pm
I wonder, does Tim Mathieson feel puffed up with importance beyond his “staton” or is he perhaps tweeting and tippling simultaneously?
“The devil makes work for idle hands”

Jazza

9 Mar 13 at 12:16 pm
It will be amusing watching the Insiders crew arguing that of course the WA election has no federal implications or relevance. State issues; people make a distinction etc.

But of course Campbell Newman is hurting Abbott.

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 12:20 pm
JamesK
Internet use is bad for your health too.
Ban it ?

jumpnmcar,
Speeding is a thrill and is bad for your health too.

Legalise speeding?

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 12:27 pm
Unintended consequences:

Last Nov Colorado made Marijuana legal.

LocalCBS: Drug Testing Company Sees Spike In Children Using Marijuana

The same people who have been working endlessly to eradicate tobacco companies have given them the leg up they need by opening a new market of products:

It’s no stretch to imagine, then, that the two industries best positioned to develop pot-based products—tobacco and pharmaceuticals—are also drafting playbooks to determine how they might capitalize on what CNBC.com estimates to be a $40-billion-a-year market.

And if there’s a battle to bring recreational cannabis to market, most believe tobacco companies would have the upper hand.

“The tobacco companies are clearly in the best position to take their existing business model and employ cannabis and they have already privately thought to do so,” says Allen St. Pierre, executive director of Norml, an advocacy group for marijuana legislation reform. “These companies are well aware that they are sitting on a business model that needs only the acquiescence of the federal government.”

Indeed. A popular urban myth maintains that Marlboro Cigarettes, a product of Philip Morris, have the trademark pre-registered for a marijuana cigarette that would be sold in short packs called Marleys—a reference to the pot-smoking reggae legend Bob Marley—with the colors of the Jamaican flag (The company, however, says it has no such product in development, nor has it registered for a trademark on a marijuana cigarette).

Token

9 Mar 13 at 12:30 pm
It will be amusing watching the Insiders crew arguing that of course the WA election has no federal implications or relevance. State issues; people make a distinction etc.

But of course Campbell Newman is hurting Abbott.

Is there a rep from The Australian on the panel? I’m sure no one will mention Richmond or Tim Matheson around Leatherface.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 12:32 pm
Legalise speeding?

On private land where you’re only going to be a danger to yourself or those who choose to be there with you.

As for marijuana (or other drugs) – just don’t take them while driving or something else potentially lethal if it significantly impairs your judgement.

Token – my understanding of the Colorado situation is that because of the way the legislation is written (a single company is not allowed to own the whole production/retail chain) it has encouraged lots of small businesses rather than the large ones. Though the legal risk federally is also probably an influence here too.

Chris

9 Mar 13 at 12:36 pm
Speeding is a thrill and is bad for your health too.

Legalise speeding?

No, just remove the limit.

Do you want all cars that exceed 110kph banned ?

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 12:39 pm
“The cost of obesity to Australia’s collective wellbeing has reached $120 billion a year – the equivalent of about 8 per cent of the economy’s annual output.

Academics in the US have the solution on how to resolve this problem:

At 4 PM today, undergraduate students in a major university will be assigned homework requiring them to lobby their local legislators in favor of a major Obama policy – fighting obesity.

…The instructor, law professor John Banzhaf, is already well known for requiring his law students – whom the press has dubbed “Banzhaf’s Bandits” – to bring legal actions in order to pass his law school course in Public Interest Law. But now he will be carrying his activist philosophy one step further by assigning homework in which undergrads will have to file a real legal document aimed at a major social problem – something which he suggests might be a first for any university

At first glance, this seems to be a great way for university to fund courses:

Banzhaf will explain how at least ten fat law suits have already been successful, including the one targeting McDonald’s brought by his law students, which started the new movement to use governmental action as a powerful but largely untapped weapon against obesity.

In that class action law suit against McDonald’s, the fast food chain was forced to pay over $12 million, to apologize to the students, and to add the disclosures to correct the misrepresentations it was accused of making. It also helped to inspire the award-winning movie “Super Size Me” in which Banzhaf appeared, and which in turn pressured McDonald’s to eliminate supersizing.

[H/t Instapundit & NRO]

Isn’t there any way people like this can be brought up on ethics charges?

Token

9 Mar 13 at 12:54 pm
Legalise speeding?

No, just remove the limit.

LOL.

I wonder if you have enough humility to admit that is stupid on two counts?

Firstly no speed limits is how you legalise speeding and secondly it would a dreadfully bad idea guaranteed to see more innocents die on our roads.

I think marijuana should be sold thru licensed dealers.

People selling to minors should be imprisoned.

Adults can do what they want as long as they don’t harm others.

Driving with that shit in your system must have severe penalties.

What my link showed is that pot smoking has increased dramatically in Denver secondary schools since it has become legal.

People who advocate legalising marijuana here better have an idea to prevent what happened in Denver.

That is both predictable and rightfully a concern to both parents and road users in general.

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 1:01 pm
Ramd Paul. Look at me.

There’s someone who can’t tell the wind just changed.

Driftforge

9 Mar 13 at 1:02 pm
It will be amusing watching the Insiders crew arguing that of course the WA election has no federal implications or relevance. State issues; people make a distinction etc.

But of course Campbell Newman is hurting Abbott.

And of course the Vic Libs are hurting Abbott.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 1:05 pm
Something to make Jeff happy – here is the latest video on the reception Gillard received on her recent trip to Western Sydney.

It is moving footage, the people are so warm and sincere…

Token

9 Mar 13 at 1:09 pm
It will be amusing watching the Insiders crew arguing that of course the WA election has no federal implications or relevance. State issues; people make a distinction etc.

No, in view of the carnage about to be visited upon labor, there will be self-imposed black out on commentary “so soon after so many have suffered”.

The delusion at their ABC is stubborn and persistent :

First-term state governments rarely lose elections but a strong Labor campaign means the Opposition should not be written off just yet.

This after a lengthy ‘analysis’.

Up to the minute information can also be found at http://www.abc.net.au/news/wa or follow @abcnewsPerth on Twitter.

Worth checking to see when the tears start flowing.

Keith

9 Mar 13 at 1:09 pm
And of course the Vic Libs are hurting Abbott

Yes and the monk surely now has no legitimacy complaining about the Labor’s faceless men etc etc

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 1:10 pm
First-term state governments rarely lose elections but a strong Labor campaign means the Opposition should not be written off just yet.

Oh yes. That line was repeatedly repeated on their ABC24 yesterday as though it was a magical mantra that would bring about a win to Labor. The delusion is set to maximum over at their non-partisan ABC.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 1:13 pm
…my understanding of the Colorado situation is that because of the way the legislation is written (a single company is not allowed to own the whole production/retail chain) it has encouraged lots of small businesses rather than the large ones.

Large corporations are able to engineer entity structures to fit the legal rules built by legislators better than small businesses.

Watch this space, but give it a couple of years and big pharma or tobacco will be dominating due to their established supply chains and marketing systems.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 1:14 pm
I wonder if you have enough humility to admit that is stupid on two counts?

Firstly no speed limits is how you legalise speeding and secondly it would a dreadfully bad idea guaranteed to see more innocents die on our roads.

Firstly the speed limit is a concocted limit not backed by evidence that on a particular piece of road 105kph is more dangerous than 100kph. You saying ” legalise speeding ” assumes speeding is bad and legalise it anyway. My ” remove the limit ” makes no such stupid assumption.
That also covers your second stupid assumption.

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 1:15 pm
Something more to make Jeff happy – especially if he can’t make it to the funeral because of longstanding business engagements:

Maduro: Chavez body to be permanently displayed

Maduro also announced that Chavez’s body will be preserved in the same manner as that of Russia’s Vladimir Lenin or China’s Mao Zedong, so “he will always be with the people.”

Visitors will be able to view Chavez’s body in a special tomb now under construction in a Caracas museum devoted to his populist revolution.

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 1:23 pm
Firstly the speed limit is a concocted limit not backed by evidence that on a particular piece of road 105kph is more dangerous than 100kph. You saying ” legalise speeding ” assumes speeding is bad and legalise it anyway

The answer is clearly a big ‘NO‘

Straw-men arguments are easier to deal with emotionally speaking

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 1:25 pm
You keep dreaming of a government imposed perfect world James, I’m going to watch a movie with speeding, drug use and guns whilst I still can.
There might even be some gratuitous internet usage too.

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 1:33 pm
You keep dreaming of a government imposed perfect world James,

Go f-ck your pathetic strawman jumpnmcar

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 1:41 pm
The Obama proves to all how little it knows of history & the constitution:

New CIA director John Brennan was sworn into office Friday on the original draft of the Constitution — as in, the one drafted in 1787, four years before it included the Bill of Rights.

It is a symbolic thing, but the White House got the symbolism wrong. Brennan has been criticized for being involved in, or at least aware of, various CIA policies that trouble civil libertarians. Brennan said he knew of, but did nothing to stop, the torture of war-on-terror detainess under the Bush administration. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul filibustered Brennan’s nomination on Wednesday and into Thursday, demanding the Obama administration say whether it believed it had the power to use a drone to kill and American citizen not engaged in combat on American soil. (Attorney General Eric Holder said the answer was no.)

Token

9 Mar 13 at 1:45 pm
You keep dreaming of a government imposed perfect world James, I’m going to watch a movie with speeding, drug use and guns whilst I still can.
There might even be some gratuitous internet usage too.

I don’t think JamesK said anything about a speed limit being ‘perfect’, Jump. It’s simply a limit as to what is reasonable on this or that stretch of road. For instance, I think it is reasonable to have a speed limit of 60km/hr on local residential streets. You seem to be suggesting that the limit here should be determined by the individual driver’s judgement given the time of day, weather, nature of the road, and so on.

dover_beach

9 Mar 13 at 2:02 pm
Maduro: Chavez body to be permanently displayed

The question is whether he’ll reconstruct the body of Simon Bolivar he had exhumed and pulled apart which lead him to believe he was Bolivar reincarnated:

In the early hours of July 16—just at the midnight hour, to be precise—Venezuela’s capo officiated at a grisly ceremony. This involved the exhumation of the mortal remains of Simón Bolívar, leader of Latin America’s rebellion against Spain, who died in 1830.

…”I had some doubts, but after seeing his remains, my heart said, ‘Yes, it is me.’ Father, is that you, or who are you? The answer: ‘It is me, but I awaken every hundred years when the people awaken.’ “

…I didn’t realist the ABC’s hero was a 9/11 troofer…

As his tirade against evil America mounted, Penn broke in to say that surely Chávez would be happy to see the arrest of Osama Bin Laden.

I was hugely impressed by the way that the boss scorned this overture. He essentially doubted the existence of al-Qaida, let alone reports of its attacks on the enemy to the north. “I don’t know anything about Osama Bin Laden that doesn’t come to me through the filter of the West and its propaganda.” To this, Penn replied that surely Bin Laden had provided quite a number of his very own broadcasts and videos. I was again impressed by the way that Chávez rejected this proffered lucid-interval lifeline. All of this so-called evidence, too, was a mere product of imperialist television.

…and didn’t believe in the moon landing:

After all, “there is film of the Americans landing on the moon,” he scoffed. “Does that mean the moon shot really happened? In the film, the Yanqui flag is flying straight out. So, is there wind on the moon?” As Chávez beamed with triumph at this logic, an awkwardness descended on my comrades, and on the conversation.

FFS, the people who hero worship this guy call people who are skeptical about the AGW cult anti-science.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 2:05 pm
I’m not sure what’s wrong. If I try and read the Cat on my iMac it says the site is down but is ok on my ipad

Nic

9 Mar 13 at 2:12 pm
Clean your cache.

dover_beach

9 Mar 13 at 2:22 pm
The revolution in the newspaper business has tipped hundreds, even thousands, of Australian journalists out of their jobs. Many of them have high political and media skills, and rather more of a stake in the future of this country than some abrasive Scottish blow-in. Gillard’s boast that she will ”stop foreign workers being put at the front of the queue with Australian workers at the back” therefore reeks of hypocrisy.

Mike Carlton

stackja

9 Mar 13 at 2:39 pm
Did anyone catch Ed Husic on Chris Kenny’s sky show today….For fucks sake – these people are hopeless!

Dianne

9 Mar 13 at 2:40 pm
Jeff
Are you having a stroke as you’re not making any sense… Even less so than usual.

JC

9 Mar 13 at 2:47 pm
The revolution in the newspaper business has tipped hundreds, even thousands, of Australian journalists out of their jobs.

Why should Carlton be surprised? All revolutions start with the media being the first group lined up against the wall.

Splatacrobat

9 Mar 13 at 2:47 pm
Oh how I love the sight of lefties raging against da Murdoch.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 2:47 pm
Just think of the wonderful results if Mike Carlton was advising Gillard instead of the Scottish git.

Entropy

9 Mar 13 at 2:59 pm
The fuck?

it’s A OK for the state, through the ABC to subsidise the promotion of the political agenda for a foreign media mogul, providing he is reflecting your prejudices.

FFS, there’s no room left for new sponsors at the ABC. Its $1.2 billion budget is already fully committed to the propaganda effort for the Australian Greens.

I’m looking forward to the squealing as this zombie politburo has its out-of-control budget slashed and is forced to meet new accountability metrics.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 3:03 pm
Is the angry white middle-aged man who was imported to advise the angry Welsh white female PM really Scottish? He was born in England and moved to Scotland when he was aged four.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 3:07 pm
DB
JamesK is trying to the ” one size fits all ” crap.
If you live in the real world, and I think you do( down to earth commenter as you have been), sometimes weed helps people be better people. Sometimes a road is quite safe to do 130kph. Sometimes the internet is great for your health and sometimes guns make some people safer.
Sometimes not.
Spruiking some insignificant study to reenforce a personal bias is bupkis and JamesK is infamous for it.
Question to James K; ” How has the smoking of Mary Jane, by another person, affected YOUR life?”
(disclaimer; I smoked weed 22 years ago, inhaled and everything)

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 3:35 pm
Jeff, did you watch the little video I found for you?

It must make your heart beat so fast seeing so much sincere love

Token

9 Mar 13 at 3:43 pm
Token, so it’s wrong to subsidise jobs for workers using the tariff,…

Yes, I’m glad we agree on this. I remember talking with someone recently but they did not post under the name of Jeff then…

…yet it’s A OK for the state, through the ABC to subsidise the promotion of the political agenda for a foreign media mogul, providing he is reflecting your prejudices.

Strange, I strongly disagree with a foreign media mogul’s view on AGW which is in alignment with the Groupthink at the ABC.

I don’t believe it is ok for the taxpayer funded ABC to present a single view without alternate arguments as all taxpayers fund the service.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 3:47 pm
Jeff or whatever head of the hydra I am talking to, what is the key issue being communicated by the article?

Token

9 Mar 13 at 3:50 pm
Hi JC, thanks for coming in, let me be the first to wish you all the best on your eighty third birthday and I sincerely hope you have many more, your regular comments on this blog make my day. Stop worrying about the insomnia, that is not the cause of your wizened old frame, it’s your great age mate, enjoy it while you can.

You try hard, Jeff.

A word of advice. Putdowns is an art form. You either have it or you don’t. You clearly don’t.

JC

9 Mar 13 at 3:51 pm
I just finished a couple of hours of a face to face Roy Morgan poll.

Very different to a phone poll and an interesting interviewer.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 4:01 pm
DB
JamesK is trying to the ” one size fits all ” crap.

No.

No, I wasn’t as a quick read of our exchanges since I posted an interesting link about what happened to teenagers in Denver since marijuana was legalised last November that you responded to stupidly and then even twice as stupidly upon each subsequent engagement.

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 4:03 pm
Hey Jeff did you know that sometimes the ABC reports the result of Newspoll?

Keith

9 Mar 13 at 4:03 pm
I just finished a couple of hours of a face to face Roy Morgan poll.

Very different to a phone poll and an interesting interviewer.

Well?

Please give us an account of a 2 hour face to face polling

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 4:04 pm
Spruiking some insignificant study to reenforce a personal bias is bupkis and JamesK is infamous for it.
Question to James K; ” How has the smoking of Mary Jane, by another person, affected YOUR life?”
(disclaimer; I smoked weed 22 years ago, inhaled and everything)

Create as much confusion and strawmewn as possible else anyone might read and notice jumpncar has been skewered

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 4:07 pm
Gillard’s boast that she will ”stop foreign workers being put at the front of the queue with Australian workers at the back” therefore reeks of hypocrisy.

Mike Carlton

Mike Carlton is a thoroughly loathsome and inadequate man.

Not even TLS would be stupid enough to hire that turd

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 4:10 pm
Please give us an account of a 2 hour face to face polling

Noooo! It’ll take two hours.

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 4:10 pm
An hour or so of it was chatting with the guy and discussing my opinions compared with his.

I think I am now well aware of how the “progresive” variance of face to face polling occurs. It takes a bit of effort of mind to continue to state your case when you are sitting over a cup of coffee with a pleasant person.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 4:11 pm
~~progresive~~ progressive

What did we cover …

Federal politics but really only who would you vote for and who did you vote for. A little bit of asking and the other stuff and back to it later.

What do you read and watch on TV.
Who do you bank with and insure with and how much do you love them.

What newspapers and mags do you read/ have you read

Placement questions; household shape, own/rent/mortgage, kids, education etc

Is Australia going forward or back , are prices going to go up or down, What makes you voye the way you’re thinking.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 4:16 pm
JC, I think that the wit has been deliberately turned down by “Jeff”.
What do you think the chances are that he is actually the loathsome bore, Bob Ellis?
He seems to exhibit the same sort of familiarity with you as previous outbreaks of Bob.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

9 Mar 13 at 4:20 pm
I ‘think’ I was phone polled this morning.

The phone rang and I picked it up identifying myself. Immediately heard an unfamiliar voice going on about how Newman is planning to privatise certain services (I missed most of it as I was trying to work out whether I was listening to a real person or not, but health and disability was mentioned). Then I had to press a number as to whether or not I agreed to his privatisation plans or not.

The call ended without the woman (I think it was recorded) stating who the polling company was, and who it was polling for. It sounded dodgy, and the impression I got from the tone of voice was that Newman was a big meanie and I suspect the polling may have originated from the Unions.

After a year of reading about the AWU-WRA/HSU dramas I’ve become rather cynical of the unions and so voted in favour of privatisation.

Anyway, is it legit for polling companies to do automated polling without identifying themselves?

A Lurker

9 Mar 13 at 4:20 pm
~~voye~~ vote

Bottom line was how difficult I found it to feel passionate about some answers which I would normally have no issue with. The face to face aspect created pressure to empathise with your interviewer.

Didn’t change my answers but I would not be surprised that some peoples are changed.

The guy was also a very nice fellow.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 4:20 pm
He did have a nasty habit of answering questions for me while asking them. Mostly this was just a case of follow ups from previous stuff where my answer had answered 2 or 3 questions. Sometimes it wasn’t and we got to roll back and re-answer them.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 4:25 pm
Anyway, is it legit for polling companies to do automated polling without identifying themselves?

no.

Furthermore, disseminating negative information about a politician under the guise of asking a question is called “push polling”. (ie “pushing” your agenda while pretending to poll people). It’s not illegal but is widely considered to be highly unethical. No respectable polling organisation engages in push polling.

dd

9 Mar 13 at 4:29 pm
Hip hip horaaay, JamesK self identifies as a winner.
That’s a first.
Those kids in Denver have a lot to thank you for.
Try to see the idiocy of prohibition please.

jumpnmcar

9 Mar 13 at 4:30 pm
Damn. Forgot.

There was a specific question on marijuana legalisation.

None on SSM.

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 4:37 pm
Furthermore, disseminating negative information about a politician under the guise of asking a question is called “push polling”. (ie “pushing” your agenda while pretending to poll people). It’s not illegal but is widely considered to be highly unethical. No respectable polling organisation engages in push polling.

Perhaps they identified themselves after I hit the number and voted – I’m not sure, I hung up pretty quick.

I would have thought that if it was a reputable polling company they would have identified themselves first, before going off into their spiel.

I would have voted pro-privatisation anyway, but the tone the recorded ‘interviewer’ had sealed it for me.

A Lurker

9 Mar 13 at 4:39 pm
What do you think the chances are that he is actually the loathsome bore, Bob Ellis?
He seems to exhibit the same sort of familiarity with you as previous outbreaks of Bob.

Oh yea, I never thought of that. I could very well be that loathsome, tiresome portly rat.

JC

9 Mar 13 at 4:56 pm
Hip hip horaaay, JamesK self identifies as a winner.
That’s a first.
Those kids in Denver have a lot to thank you for.
Try to see the idiocy of prohibition please.

jumpnmcar is second only to Obummer in make-believe and incinerating straw-men

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 4:59 pm
So transference and counter-transference plays a role in in face to face polling.

Thanks dismissive

JamesK

9 Mar 13 at 5:00 pm
Yep. The US is suffering a supply side shock.

Welch also took some shots at the White House, saying the U.S. energy boom has the potential to power another “American Century” of economic dominance, if it weren’t for the administration’s heavy-handed regulations.

“We can’t keep throwing sand in the gears of the economy,” he said.

Welch said the cost of regulation under President Barack Obama is three-and-a-half times that of Bill Clinton’s administration’s first term and five times that of George W. Bush. And that’s not counting Obamacare, he said.

The economy now is being buoyed by $85 billion from the Federal Reserve each month, but the downward pressure from regulation, he said, is “enormous.”

He described the situation as a “regulatory morass.”

“That is holding back this economy from really taking off,” he said. “All the conditions are right to take off, if the regulatory burden could be taken down.”

Welch was at GE’s helm from 1981 to 2001, during which the company’s value rose 4000 percent. In 2009, he launched the Jack Welch Management Institute, which is now part of Strayer University.

JC

9 Mar 13 at 5:22 pm
I just finished a couple of hours of a face to face Roy Morgan poll.

Very different to a phone poll and an interesting interviewer.
The Newspoll phonepoll I took last night was nine minutes of scripted questions plus the additional few minutes required for my answers. The female inquisitor sounded very young.

Cold-Hands

9 Mar 13 at 5:22 pm
He seems to exhibit the same sort of familiarity with you as previous outbreaks of Bob.

LOL, his wee discussion with me referenced a conversation I remember having with another of Bob’s hydra heads.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 5:27 pm
I just finished a couple of hours of a face to face Roy Morgan poll.

Very different to a phone poll and an interesting interviewer.

I did that with Nielson last year, the guy who did that interview was a very interesting guy from the sub continent. Then I got a book to keep track of my media habits over a week.

Since I invested the time I keep getting phone polls from them every month on assorted topics.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 5:29 pm
Yes Minister

Cato the Elder

9 Mar 13 at 5:32 pm
In 2009, he launched the Jack Welch Management Institute, which is now part of Strayer University.

Can we please have a branch of that here?
It could be called the Ozstrayer University.

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 5:35 pm
Token

I have been left 2 books – one for TV and one for general consumer stuff – and 2 $10 gift cards.

I think the cards validate after they get the books back filled in!

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 6:14 pm
It’s just that I’ve heard Perth business complaining that, in summer, the eastern states are already on their lunch break by the time they get to the office.

It’s simple, get up earlier.

sdfc

9 Mar 13 at 6:15 pm
My guy was also from the sub-continent – Pakistan

Spooky!

dismissive

9 Mar 13 at 6:16 pm
JC

I negative supply shock would emply upward pressure on prices. If this is the case why are you cheering on the Fed?

sdfc

9 Mar 13 at 6:19 pm
I have been left 2 books – one for TV and one for general consumer stuff – and 2 $10 gift cards.

That’s what I got. On reflection, I think it was Roy Morgan not Nielsen.

My guy was also from the sub-continent – Pakistan

Spooky!

They can be hard workers. Mine told me he worked weeks in a business and the survey stuff on weekends was the money to save for his kids university. Good guy.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 6:20 pm
Try imply

sdfc

9 Mar 13 at 6:20 pm
Words like childish and comical come to mind: it was well-known in Canberra that the Oz had a story today about the First Fuck Buddy’s poor behaviour. So Fairfax comes to the rescue with some counter-propaganda:

Tim Mathieson is about to climb into the saddle to raise $100,000 to fight child slavery in Cambodia.

The Prime Minister’s partner plans to ride in a pack of about 50 bikers from Kirribilli House in Sydney to The Lodge in Canberra, via Wollongong, Kangaroo Valley and the Hume Highway, astride a brand new machine on loan from BMW.

Each of his riding partners, most of whom will come from the business community, will pay a minimum of $2000 to undertake the ride. He is inviting some of Australia’s best-known motorcycle racers and enthusiasts, including world champion Mick Doohan and V8 Supercars driver Will Davison, as well as ”old mate”, Glenn McGrath, who rides a Ducati Multistrada 1200.

To ensure the idiot has an assured stream of attention, FXJ announces:

Fairfax will accompany Mr Mathieson on his ride.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 6:24 pm
The Prime Minister’s partner plans to ride in a pack of about 50 bikers from Kirribilli House in Sydney to The Lodge in Canberra, via Wollongong, Kangaroo Valley and the Hume Highway, astride a brand new machine on loan from BMW.

Not fit enough to join Abbott’s pollie pedallers is my take on this stunt.

It has all the hallmarks of an American ripoff pommie sitcom like Steptoe and Son or The Office only even more contrived.

Proceeds of Pollie Pedal 2013 will be used to:

activate our Carer Aware Workplaces program for employers
expand our Carer Ambassador program to achieve greater community awareness of the needs of carers
fund consultations with Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander carers to further develop practical ways to overcome isolation; and
fund carer engagement activities across the country

Tim Sassoon wants to fight child slavery in another country. He could do that by just clicking like on the Kony 2012 website from the comfort of the Kirribilli couch.

Splatacrobat

9 Mar 13 at 6:49 pm
Good point, Splat. I may need to steal that.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 6:53 pm
My QOTD:

“No soldier wants to be led by a commander that has voluntarily decided to have his balls cut off. No amount of politically-correct propaganda will change this fact.”

Well, when you put it like that…….

nilk

9 Mar 13 at 6:56 pm
Aren’t the Finks also travelling North?

Steve of Glasshouse

9 Mar 13 at 7:37 pm
Less than an hour and a half ’til we get to start opening the next instalment of the present that keeps on giving — Lying Slut 2013, who can’t campaign outside Victoria and Tasmania, such is the stench:

WA premier Colin Barnett and Labor leader Mark McGowan have cast their votes in the West Australian election, as the Opposition braces for an emphatic defeat.

Mr Barnett – voting in his Perth beachside electorate of Cottesloe – said he was buoyed by today’s Newspoll, which recorded a commanding lead for the Liberal-Nationals. On a two-party preferred basis the coalition leads Labor 59.5 per cent-40.5 per cent, according to the Newspoll taken exclusively for The Weekend Australian this week.

Mr Barnett, accompanied to the polling booth by deputy federal Opposition leader Julie Bishop, repeated his claim throughout the campaign that at least 12 seats were in the balance.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 7:40 pm
I read this today and thought it ridiculous. Bolt also has it in his sights, but thanks to the appalling lawfare that degrades our polity – can say nothing.
Can you be proud of your heritage while refusing to breed?

blogstrop

9 Mar 13 at 7:48 pm
Ha ha Tom. The First Fuck Buddy. Very droll. I have just read the article in the Oz magazine and then scrolled this thread for the fun I knew you would all be having with it. Am lying in five star comfort in Sydney testing out my new Android with my selection of pillows from the Pillow Menu awaiting room service dins while Da Hairy Ape is ODing on Sydney FC on home ground and other football on the telly. Disuaded him from attending in person as that would not be romantic for me. We are flying off to our secret atoll tomorrow.

Poor Ape is shellshocked from a houseful of my girlfriends for the past three days. We went lunching a lot in wineries. They bought him back nice bottles of wine. Silver linings Lizzie, he said, as he imbibed sufficient of these each night to amuse them greatly with funny stories.

And now those WA election results will be getting us pretty excited tonight.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.

9 Mar 13 at 7:49 pm
Lizzie, I stole that wonderful descriptor from Fleeced.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 7:57 pm
ABC24 will be televising the schadenfreude-fest that is the WA election from 9.30pm.

Gab

9 Mar 13 at 8:03 pm
Ha ha Tom. The First Fuck Buddy. Very droll.

He is neither the first nor will he be the last.

Splatacrobat

9 Mar 13 at 8:20 pm
For those (like me) who will not be able to sit through the Green left’s analysis on the ABC of why Western Australia made the massive mistake of re-electing Colin Barnett, the Sky coverage has already started.

Tom

9 Mar 13 at 8:32 pm
Sorry Tom. Just headed straight for the OT. Great threads on Tim I see. Well done, Fleeced.

Elizabeth (Lizzie) B.

9 Mar 13 at 8:39 pm
The exit poll talking about the issues people values in making their vote in the WA ELECTION is very bad for Labor. Performance of fed Govt, mining tax, carbon tax and cost of living featuring strongly.

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 8:57 pm
“No soldier wants to be led by a commander that has voluntarily decided to have his balls cut off. No amount of politically-correct propaganda will change this fact.”

Could be a comedy routine there…

“Torture? Pffft… My commander is so tough, he had his own balls chopped off”

“Pfft, that’s nothing. My commander cut his own balls off with a rusty pocket knife”

“He used a knife? Bloody pansy! My commander chopped off his balls with a thousand shallow paper cuts – and used lemon juice for disinfectant”

“Lemons? Luxury. My commander…”

Fleeced

9 Mar 13 at 8:59 pm
He is neither the first nor will he be the last.

Hint: “First” doesn’t mean chronologically – just as “First Lady” isn’t referring to Eve.

Fleeced

9 Mar 13 at 9:03 pm
“No soldier wants to be led by a commander that has voluntarily decided to have his balls cut off. No amount of politically-correct propaganda will change this fact.”

No no no. Diversity is a strength. The ball-less commander will lead us all to victory.

jupes

9 Mar 13 at 9:08 pm
The ball-less commander will lead us all to victory.

“Sure, he’s a bit of a pansy – but after a bout of roshambo, he’s always the last man standing!”

Fleeced

9 Mar 13 at 9:13 pm
Talk about a country being one step away from being a third world toilet:

What a way to treat a heroine: Royal Navy girl who fought in Afghanistan told to cover up uniform on Virgin flight in case it offended other passengers. Everyone involved should be fired. “To clarify, a British airline who claims to be Britain’s flag carrier won’t allow a member of Britain’s armed forces to travel on their airline in uniform.”

[h/t Instapundit]

Token

9 Mar 13 at 9:25 pm
Kerry O’Brien is very sombre already.

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 9:34 pm
Big sinwgs already to the L/NP

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 9:45 pm
Hi Token

Saw that one earlier today, and thought it a strong example of my view that somewhere recently customer service died, but I missed the funeral notice.

This based on heaps of recent examples for us ( Mrs Myrrdin and your humble servant ), family and work colleagues where either staff are not trained/encouraged/empowered to proactively reach out to their customers.

Or this example in the UK where the over riding corporate philosophy seems to be ‘**** you’.

This example in the UK where, for reasons that can only be imagined, the security goon decided he didn’t like a uniformed female service person AND the ground staff went along with it despite no rules to the effect claimed, is just about the biggest FU demonstrable.

And the goon’s employer denies any knowledge.

Myrrdin Seren

9 Mar 13 at 9:45 pm
Andrew, I’m surprised they haven’t thrown to a repeat of The Bill or something already

Token

9 Mar 13 at 9:46 pm
Token, Kerry is really struggling already. At least in the Vic election in 2010, he had some hope for Labor.

Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 9:47 pm
I have opened an election thread.

Sinclair Davidson

9 Mar 13 at 9:49 pm
“The decision to pay for sex change operations should be overturned. It does not enhance Defence’s ability to protect Australia and most people would describe it as a completely unnecessary ‘capability cut’.”

The Australian Army paid for one of its ‘soldiers’ to be turned into a ‘woman’?

What a pathetic, silly little organisation the ADF is.

It’s actually ridiculous to even call them an army.

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 9:51 pm
This based on heaps of recent examples for us ( Mrs Myrrdin and your humble servant ), family and work colleagues where either staff are not trained/encouraged/empowered to proactively reach out to their customers.

MS, in the 90′s, post recession, everyone was taught the Japanese way where the customer is king.

During the 00′s people seemed to have been taught that they need to be validated more than the people whose money is providing their job. It seems to have got worse after 5 years of the government stoking envy & hate to stay in power.

Token

9 Mar 13 at 9:54 pm
The Australian Army paid for one of its ‘soldiers’ to be turned into a ‘woman’?

He/she was from 2RAR. Sooo proud!!

John Mc

9 Mar 13 at 10:11 pm
The Australian Army paid for one of its ‘soldiers’ to be turned into a ‘woman’?

I read this only this week:

A few months ago, a federal court in Massachusetts ruled that the United States Constitution requires the Commonwealth’s Department of Corrections to pay for a sex-change surgery requested by an inmate who is serving time for murder. It is cruel and unusual punishment, the court reasoned, to force the prisoner to keep his anatomy intact while he is incarcerated.

Strange days indeed.

dover_beach

9 Mar 13 at 10:39 pm
Said it before, say it again: the top brass of the ADF are a bunch of pimped-up, medallion-wearing clowns – almost none of whom have ever served in a war. Their number one priority is politics; specifically, Canberra politics – with its now compulsory obedience to phony grievance morality. The complainant above makes the case eloquently. The ADF has paid for an officer to have his balls cut off. Just the kind of warrior you want to lead men into battle.

C.L.

9 Mar 13 at 11:25 pm
Let me at ‘em… let me at ‘em!

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 1:03 am
Rudd won’t be taking any solace from this:

JULIA Gillard’s leadership faces a crucial fortnight with Labor powerbrokers privately canvassing the option of a delegation of MPs urging her to stand aside.

In another blow, an exclusive Galaxy Poll conducted for The Sunday Telegraph reveals the ALP’s primary vote has dropped three points in the past month to just 32 per cent.

Faced with the choice between Ms Gillard, a fresh face or the man Ms Gillard replaced as prime minister, Kevin Rudd, only one in three voters believed Ms Gillard should remain PM.

While she is expected to fight off any further attempts to destabilise her leadership, Labor MPs bracing for more dire polls have warned it could prove unsustainable.

Galaxy revealed voters are divided over the leadership: 33 per cent believe Labor must elect a fresh face such as Bill Shorten or Greg Combet – a prospect MPs say is unlikely.

Confronted with the choice, 32 per cent of the total polled suggested the ALP should stick it out with Ms Gillard. Support for the status quo was strongest among Labor voters. Kevin Rudd was the third choice on 26 per cent, a surprise after several polls declared him a vote-switcher.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 1:24 am
Rabz, did you see the doco on the making of Quadrophenia on SBS today? Good stuff it was too.

One of the greatest albums of the 70′s for mine.

tbh

10 Mar 13 at 1:28 am
If some cardinals needed another excuse not to elect an American as pope, they now have it: US cardinals in Rome told to stop talking to media.

Americans really have a hard time separating responsibility from entertainment.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 2:10 am
Potemkin’s Village

Flashback: Friends rally… here

Grigory Potemkin

10 Mar 13 at 3:21 am
Kids on the internet:

“Jack is a fifteen year old freshman in high school. He developed a paper sensor that could detect pancreatic, ovarian and lung cancer in five minutes for as little as 3 cents.”

Ellen of Tasmania

10 Mar 13 at 8:07 am
Wow! Just love that Goldplated Electricity System the wildly increased prices are consistently blamed on – as a smokescreen for a list of loopy Green schemes and da big Carbon Tax.
One and a half hours of blackout this morning.. Thanks for nothing, Labor Greenery.
How’s it feeling now the results are in for WA?
A tad panicky? Somewhat Queasy?
Deservedly so.

blogstrop

10 Mar 13 at 8:19 am
CL, Cardinals Burke and George appear to be quite alright – they get the luvvies screaming.

Cdl Dolan on the other hand……

nilk

10 Mar 13 at 8:35 am
Ellen, the boy is a genius. Know how you can tell? At one stage, he raves about the value of the internet and says “there are millions of me out there”. In other words, genius is not a talent, but an absence of obstructions.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 8:42 am
Here comes Leatherface!

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:01 am
Alisha O’Flahrety telling us what a good job Labor did under difficult circumstances.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:05 am
Insiders – they should rename it the Mourning Show.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:09 am
Of them all, only Gerard Henderson thinks the Libs contributed to their success.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:11 am
This morning’s zombies: Andrew Probyn (West Australian), Lenore Taylor and Ol’ Leathery; Token Conservative Gerard Henderson.

Probyn opens up with the assertion that federal Labor accounted for only 1.5% of the 7% swing to the Libs.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:11 am
Henderson trying to get Gillard off the hook.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:12 am
Hawkie’s bumboy says it’s not federal Labor’s fault — it’s McGowan’s.

But WA is quickly swept aside so the zombies can talk about how bad the Victorian Liberal government is.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:14 am
Some irrelevant blather about some place south of Queensland. Who cares?

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:15 am
Federal Labor implications?
Nothing to see here, please move along.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:17 am
Libs flog Labor in WA. Bugger so lets talk about Victoria and disfunctional Liberals.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:19 am
This is disgraceful. The story of the day is the role of federal issues in the WA election and it is being ignored so the ABC’s political agenda can be pursued.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:23 am
ABC is disgraceful so hardly surprising

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:23 am
Sky News exit polling showed that 51 per cent of voters considered the performance of the federal Labor government to be an important factor in the way they voted.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:24 am
Next on insiders – da evil furriners

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:24 am
Quelle Horreur. There was a shot of the Barren touching a child
Yuk

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:25 am
WTF? La Snore outraged that a sacked staffer gets some money from donors but Shagger rorts money from workers and thats okay.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:25 am
Insiders – some gratuitous shots of TLS, the porrige wog, mr wong & tubbsy.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:26 am
Will Ol’ Leathery discuss the Mousse Salesman’s recent media coverage? He could provide a first hand account – and demonstrate what a biased, partisan, washed up old hack he truly is.

H B Bear

10 Mar 13 at 9:27 am
Some Labour cretin says that its bad because the 457s are increasing .
Can’t have the economy growing. Cretinous cretin. Where does Labor get these idiots

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:28 am
Insiders – o’connor softball interview.

Shouldn’t he be licking windows somewhere.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:28 am
Yes you should see 457s growing faster than employment when the domestic source of Labour is finite and the international source is almost infinite.
F ing total idiot.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:29 am
O’connor seems to be channeling his inner white australia policy.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:30 am
Gillard’s latest immigration minister: 457 problem is AbbottAbbottAbbott.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:30 am
The big story on Insiders?
The fact that the Victorian Libs paid $22,500 as a de-facto severance payment to a staffer who was forced to resign for “underminding” Simon Overland.
Lenore Taylor putting on her best shock-horror face at the mere suggestion, but I seem to remember when the NSW ALP paid $300,000 in legal fees for Shagger Thomson Lenore thought that “was a matter for the party”.
Hypocrite!
I think the WA result and the impending implosion of the Bollard Regime is leaving a bitter taste.

Leigh Lowe

10 Mar 13 at 9:30 am
So Labor has been in power since 2007 and the system is no good.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:32 am
It isn’t corruption but I certainly don’t think donors would be happy that their money is being used for those purposes.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:32 am
the crackdown on 457 visas should be renamed The Pauline Hanson Immigration Scheme Ammendment act.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:32 am
O’Connor is all over the place….Embarrassing.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:33 am
Idiot is still wooing the unions who are stuff all of the population

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:33 am
Does o’connor have a clue what he is talking about?

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:34 am
Cretin keeps asserting that the 457s growing faster than domestic finite employment is proof. Utter dribbling cretin.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:35 am
O’Connor crapping on about TAFE cuts. TAFE cuts are in courses where subsequent employment is very limited you [do you eat with mouth? Sinc], O’Connnor. It seems he wants people to come to this country and do a course where they won’t get a subsequent job.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:37 am
Back to Victoria. Please focus on Victoria.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:37 am
So o’connor thinks that ‘reform’ is more red tape.

What a freaking dribbler.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:38 am
Racist cretin. Thought he was only stupid. Racist as well

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:38 am
Story of the day gets five minutes. Now we’ve had 25 minutes on how bad the Victorian government is and 457 ALP unicorn talking point.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:38 am
Oh he’s a migrant. That proves he’s not racist. After all no racists ever migrate here.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:39 am
15 seconds on the story of the day

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:40 am
The ALP could do with a couple of 457′s as candidates in the upcoming election. Some skilled politicians from OS to fill local seats where the skill levels are non existant.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:40 am
LOL, these Labor cronies talk think incumbency explains an increase in the primary vote of almost 9.9% for the Libs and Nats.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:40 am
Some lady with foreign accent loves Julia

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:41 am
Back to WA – it’s only state issues.

o’connor is a drooling cretin.

More shots of the droner from altona.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:41 am
‘Ol Leathery did manage to ask O’Connor whether the Victorian Liberals gave a good example of how to get rid of a leader in a bloodless manner.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

10 Mar 13 at 9:41 am
Lenore saying how sad that politics is being played by the politicians.
Good God she’s noted the minister is disingenuous.
She must be having a fit.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:43 am
Oh my God! Lenore just gave both barrels to O’Connor and the ALP about their dissembling and lies with the 457′s.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

10 Mar 13 at 9:45 am
the panel generally bags o’connor. Lesnore looks like she is about to burst into tears.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:45 am
Has lesnore just realised that this gubbermint is a stuttering clusterfvck.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:47 am
Henderson told he’s wrong that the carbon tax matters

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:48 am
Henderson being shouted down for suggesting Labor’s problems are about policy, not who’s leading the party.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:48 am
ABC journos need to get an OHS ruling. They shouldn’t have to report traumatic news – too stressful.
Wars, famine, pestilence ? No, just labor defeats.

Keith

10 Mar 13 at 9:49 am
Oooh Look over there. Bob Carr saying his department did wrong.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:49 am
Insiders – Henderson is happily eviscerating the panel.

Gratuitous shot of bob carr the talking skull. Can anyone make sense of what he says?

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:49 am
Leather face thinks the carbon tax backlash has subsided. Yeah Barry just keep thinkin that you prat.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:50 am
They’re almost finished and the story of the day got five fucking minutes.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:51 am
The Mosad agent is old news, lets talk about Tim Sasntitlement.soon and his rant of e

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:52 am
Lenore knows it is a conspiracy.

WhaleHunt Fun

10 Mar 13 at 9:52 am
rant of entitlement

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:53 am
Someone get lesnore a box of tissues.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 9:54 am
I bet some pinkos will be tweeting that Insiders has been ambushed by conservatives…expect GetUp to launch a campaign.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:54 am
Anyone up for some drinking games with WA votes tonight? I might be trialling my ‘down a drink per seat lost’ for September 14
Andrew

9 Mar 13 at 10:28 am

How did the trial go, Andrew?

Are you ok the this morning?

eam

10 Mar 13 at 9:54 am
More accurately, Lenore knows it’s Israel’s fault. Fairfax, after all, is the Australian voice of the Jew hater.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 9:55 am
Le Snore is the new Mrs Magoo.

H B Bear

10 Mar 13 at 9:57 am
How did the trial go, Andrew?

Are you ok the this morning?

I was a little bit groggy but I didn’t down one drink per seat.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:57 am
Gerard attacking Chavez on ABC. Bye bye Gerard

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 9:59 am
Henderson reminds the Sandalistas what a disaster Chavez was. Good one Gerard

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 9:59 am
Fairfax lampoons public figure on moral grounds – refers to marital status vis-a-vis sex life, scare-quotes “companion,” denounces oafishness and freebie luxury accommodation, mocks former beauty industry worker…

Tim Matheson, come on down – right?

No.

Forget planes, trains and automobiles. It’s private choppers, water taxis and luxury yachts for British television star Jeremy Clarkson.

The scandal-prone Top Gear host’s trip to Sydney has been controversial since claims he called Australians ”convicts” and said he never wanted to return here. But he has still been given the red-carpet treatment.

The obnoxious host, who is here for the Top Gear Festival Sydney – an outdoor motoring event at Sydney Motorsport Park, Eastern Creek, this weekend – has had a no-expenses spared run since arriving last Tuesday.

Clarkson is staying in a multimillion-dollar harbourside mansion in Mosman, during his week-long sojourn with his ”travelling companion” and former mistress, beautician-turned-Top Gear live show employee Phillipa Sage.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 10:01 am
Bolt seems to be piling on TLS. heh heh.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 10:02 am
was a little bit groggy but I didn’t down one drink per seat.

Chicken, or responsible drinking?

eam

10 Mar 13 at 10:02 am
Chicken, or responsible drinking?

Or avoiding liver failure?

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 10:04 am
Chicken, or responsible drinking?

Both and I wanted to be sane when watching Barnett take victory.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 10:04 am
Clarkson is a knob. Porking the staff is always a bad look.

H B Bear

10 Mar 13 at 10:10 am
Liverpool Liberal mayor, Lebanese muslim Ned Mannoun, on Bolt says the Libs are the new party of the worker because Labor is damaging jobs and the economy.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 10:11 am
I can’t believe they are trying to make a story out of Jeremy clarkson! So a rich,successful famous guy has a luxury lifestyle? So what? It’s not like he got the aust government to fork out a million bucks for his trip.

brc

10 Mar 13 at 10:15 am
Amanda Vanstone wearing one of her gorgeous designer blouses. Della Bosca looks as though he was pulled in from mowing the lawn.

johanna

10 Mar 13 at 10:17 am
Yes brc, such things are only allowed for Oprah and Ellen, then its OK if someone else pays.

Pickles

10 Mar 13 at 10:23 am
ShakeMyHead.com continues its vicious campaign to damage Fairfax’s main rival in the Sydney radio market while failing to disclose the fact.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 10:27 am
… did you see the doco on the making of Quadrophenia on SBS today?

Sorry tbh – didn’t even know it was on as I rarely ever watch free to air TV. Last night’s WA election ‘coverage’ being a typical exception.

I’ll try and find it on youtube.

Rabz

10 Mar 13 at 10:28 am
I only happened upon it by chance when looking through the TV guide yesterday. Worth a look.

tbh

10 Mar 13 at 10:32 am
Thanks for the running commentary, peoples!

Very funny.

Rabz

10 Mar 13 at 10:38 am
ShakeMyHead.com is still terrified by what happened in Japan two years ago:

Two years on, Japan’s tsunami and nuclear disaster casts a long, terrifying shadow.

It’s a simple human interest story about survivors, but:

…to mark the anniversary of the March 11 disaster is not merely a ceremonial nod to an event confined to its moment in time. It is to take fresh stock of a living disaster – the poisoning of air, land and water – its end not in sight, its impacts yet unknown.

Not a skerrick of science in the whole 100-or-so words. If you have a catastropharian narrative to peddle, ShakeMyHead is your go-to popular comic.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 10:47 am
Curious that the Teachers’ Union has pro-Gonski ads scheduled throughout the Bolt Report and Meet the Press.

Cold-Hands

10 Mar 13 at 10:47 am
1000-or-so.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 10:51 am
CH, that’s good tactical strategy by the sales staff at Ten.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 10:52 am
A polished performance by Julie Bishop on Meet the Press. Impressive despite little sleep after WA Liberal victory.

Cold-Hands

10 Mar 13 at 10:54 am
Fairfax lampoons public figure on moral grounds – refers to marital status vis-a-vis sex life, scare-quotes “companion,” denounces oafishness and freebie luxury accommodation, mocks former beauty industry worker…

Interestingly, the Telegraph said pretty mush the same thing. I wonder what’s getting up their collective nostrils?

nic

10 Mar 13 at 11:26 am
They hate Clarkson because he takes no PC bullshit AND he is hugely popular and successful due to the combustion of ( shudder ) fossil fuels in frivolous automotive stunts that aren’t ‘eco-friendly’.

He is living proof that the cult of green austerity enjoys about zero mass support.

Myrrdin Seren

10 Mar 13 at 11:35 am
Nic, the Daily Tele had a big sooky-wooky because Clarkson abused various journalists for harrassing him and his companions at a restaurant last week.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 11:51 am
Thanks, just curious. Clarkson has been pretty tame when you think about it. His comments about cigarette packets were funny yet the pursed lips brigade have found offence.

nic

10 Mar 13 at 11:54 am
Still anyone insisting the NRL drugs story is a beat-up?

Sharks chairman Damian Irvine claims players were injected with horse drugs.

And yes, word is that several players went to horse drug man privately after he was sacked. They knew exactly what they were doing (and taking).

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 11:58 am
I missed Clarkson’s cigarette comments. What did he say?

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 11:59 am
“It isn’t the road rules, it’s the cigarette packets that baffle me,” he told Nine.

“I mean, why on earth do cigarette companies put dead babies and eyeballs on the packets of cigarettes now, that’s the thing I can’t understand here.

nic

10 Mar 13 at 12:19 pm
Still anyone insisting the NRL drugs story is a beat-up?

If the evidence is so clear-cut, why has no-one been charged? Why is it all whispers and innuendo? Who benefits from that strategy? Why did the cops decide not to get involved?

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 12:26 pm
Julia Gillard interview in the Washington Post

vr

10 Mar 13 at 1:02 pm
I can’t…I just can’t make myself read it, vr. It would spoil my Sunday. There’s only so much spin and lies and BS one can take. I wish she would just disappear.

Gab

10 Mar 13 at 1:14 pm
You have impeccable instincts, Gab. It’s a revolting Emily’s List lesbian love-in:

The Republican equivalents — misleadingly called “Liberals” — deliberately embarked post the 2010 election on a sharply partisan campaign. Their aim was to force the government back to an election quickly.

Despite their best efforts, we have managed to get some very big things done, including — quite controversially — creating a carbon tax and moving to an emissions-trading scheme. We’ve got some very big reforms through, but the hyper-partisanship takes its toll. The community grows weary of it. But as President Obama showed in your own elections, ultimately, rationality and common sense can prevail.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 1:26 pm
If the evidence is so clear-cut, why has no-one been charged?

Charged with what?

The Cronulla boss admits his players took horse pills.

Not innuendo. Fact.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 1:27 pm
We’ve got some very big reforms through, but the hyper-partisanship takes its toll.

LOL.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 1:29 pm
The thing is, gillard lives for those moments when she’s interviewed by o/s press and when she goes o/s. Everything she does here is to impress the rest of the world because she’s desperate for approval from the likes of Obama.

Gab

10 Mar 13 at 1:30 pm
First commenter at that WaPo link:

Ms Gillard has brought the office of the Prime Minister of Australia into disrepute. She has admitted to having had sexual relations with one of her senior Ministers, a married man with children, and is one of a number of people subject to a Police investigation concerning allegations of fraud against a major Australian workers union.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 1:32 pm
Sorry, Gab. Didn’t mean to ruin your day.

It is worth reading it for the first comment on the piece.

vr

10 Mar 13 at 1:33 pm
Was just thinking the same, vr after reading CL’s comment.

Gab

10 Mar 13 at 1:34 pm
Also from the interview, an hilarious eexchange:

You joked with Obama when he said something about the difficulties of being an African American president?

We did have a joke about it — the first African American vs. being a single, childless, atheist woman. “You reckon you’ve got it hard?” But it was done in a very light-spirited way.

I think it would be inconceivable for me if I were an American to have turned up at the highest echelon of American politics being an atheist, single and childless. It says something about Australians in the sense that people are less interested in whether their leaders are people of faith than Americans are. We have been less inquiring and interested in family circumstances.

Like we had a choice.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 1:37 pm
First commenter at that WaPo link:

And there’s also a reply

kerANG123

As an Australian I can say that Gillard, commonly known as the Lying Slapper in Australia, is despised by the electorate for her outright dishonesty and deceit.

JC

10 Mar 13 at 1:41 pm
Foreign Minister Bob Carr said most Australians would agree Ms Corby had the right to put her case before parole authorities.

Another ALP distraction.

stackja

10 Mar 13 at 2:05 pm
being an atheist, single and childless.

She’ll admit to foreigners, but not to us, that she’s single, eh?
Just what is Timmy doing in the lodge? Polishing the strap-on?

Deadman

10 Mar 13 at 2:11 pm
And there’s also a reply

and additional replies.

I’m impressed that a lying slapper who has a propensity for sleeping with married men and whose current live in boyfriend is a sports attending entitlement whore got to hold the highest office in Australian politics

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 2:14 pm
Just read the Communist Manifesto online for Uni. God, I feel dirty after reading that. Awful stuff.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 2:21 pm
We did have a joke about it — the first African American vs. being a single, childless, atheist woman.

She said it again! So who exactly is that Tim guy, just some dude?

Reminds me of that Seinfeld episode where Jerry picks up a girl for a date and there’s just this ‘dude’ there.

George: She had a dude?
Jerry: Yeah, when I went to pick her up there was this dude.
George: How do you know it was her dude?
Jerry: What do you think it could’ve been just some dude?

Who is this Tim dude?

Andreas

10 Mar 13 at 2:23 pm
God, I feel dirty after reading that. Awful stuff.

Don’t wait to be told.

You need Palmolive Gold.

It’s really good when you sing it.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 2:26 pm
Carpe Jugulum, good advice. I had to read about J.S. Mill afterwards to feel normal again. A friend counselled me, stating that it is good to know how the enemy works.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 2:34 pm
C’mon Tiges do the right thing and cancel Timmy’s membership.

Alan

10 Mar 13 at 2:47 pm
John McTernan unavailable for comment:

Employers’ first call shouldn’t be 457 skilled migrant visa, says Immigration Minister Brendan O’Connor.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 3:33 pm
Corby has the eyes of a goat with what one suspects is a similar brain

Nic

10 Mar 13 at 4:08 pm
‘A Lurker’ wrote:

I ‘think’ I was phone polled this morning.

The phone rang and I picked it up identifying myself. Immediately heard an unfamiliar voice going on about how Newman is planning to privatise certain services … It sounded dodgy, and the impression I got from the tone of voice was that Newman was a big meanie and I suspect the polling may have originated from the Unions.

Think this is the results of that poll, Lurker: Qld privatisation opposed by 85%: poll.

Aaaand, no prizes, you were right:

The automated ReachTEL poll commissioned by public service union Together told 50,000 respondents the government would on Monday consider the Costello report into the state’s finances which recommends privatising public services, and asked if they supported or opposed the proposal.

But no mention in the article of any push polling. They wouldn’t do that, no sir.

Andreas

10 Mar 13 at 4:09 pm
Hmm. Perhaps this explains the Lying Slapper’s ‘government’.

Which is now back to Prime Minister Fisher’s view of non-white people.

Mk50 of Brisbane

10 Mar 13 at 4:44 pm
Is Catallaxy being nobbled = 24 hours after WA electors flogged Labor, we silent majority are being denied our opportunity to fully express ourselves on Catallaxy.

Has that bastard Conroy thrown a switch to nobble the normal Catallaxy access via a browser?

Mike of Marion

10 Mar 13 at 4:49 pm
And a big thanks to the morning shift who covered Inciters for the rest of us.

nilk

10 Mar 13 at 4:50 pm
ReachTEL polling has about as much credibility as a public statement by The Legover Man.

H B Bear

10 Mar 13 at 5:01 pm
And a big thanks to the morning shift who covered Inciters for the rest of us.

We wade through the filth so you don’t have to.

Carpe Jugulum

10 Mar 13 at 5:13 pm
Seems like my gut feeling was spot-on – that phone poll that I received yesterday originated from the Unions.

I read that Reach-Tel was the polling agency, although it would have been useful to know at the time who exactly was polling me.

Seems like a whopping 85% fell for the Union’s push-polling tactics – a tactic obvious from the whining-aggressive tone that was taken by the woman in the recording, a tone that immediately gave the impression that Newman was a big meanie who had to be stopped.

A Lurker

10 Mar 13 at 5:43 pm
Hi Andreas, snap!

A Lurker

10 Mar 13 at 5:44 pm
Oh goodie. Never thought of this. You gotta love Americans sometimes.

Number Of U.S. Gun Makers Refusing Sales To Gov’t In ‘Firearms Equality Movement’ Triples In Two Weeks

JC

10 Mar 13 at 6:00 pm
No mention of Tim Sassoon’s Abbott melt down on Insiders.
Leatherface must be hoping for another invitation to the footy preferably before September.

Splatacrobat

10 Mar 13 at 6:04 pm
I’ve had enough of this amateurism. The Cat is a nerds’ experiment which treats its users like farm animals. Could you just stop tinkering with it to amuse yourself and give us a professional product? If you have to go to a different business model to make it reliable, just do it.

Tom

10 Mar 13 at 8:58 pm
Abbott on 60 minutes was ok.
The producer of the story was Malcolm Howes, any relation to Piggy?

jumpnmcar

10 Mar 13 at 9:02 pm
Abbott on 60 minutes was ok.

But the segment was awful.

dover_beach

10 Mar 13 at 9:18 pm
Abbott on 60 minutes was ok.

But the segment was awful.

The media are just transfixed 24/7 on matters homo.

Infidel Tiger

10 Mar 13 at 9:24 pm
Tom:

Could you just stop tinkering with it to amuse yourself and give us a professional product? If you have to go to a different business model to make it reliable, just do it.

Tried that already.

Jacques Chester

10 Mar 13 at 9:50 pm
Looks like the current round of exploding was caused by MySQL. yippee.

Jacques Chester

10 Mar 13 at 9:50 pm
Looks like the current round of exploding was caused by MySQL. yippee.

I love it when you talk techno.

Gab

10 Mar 13 at 9:52 pm
Sharks sink teeth into Gold Coast Titans!

Big morale booster in the Shire but a nail-biting finish.

Rafe

10 Mar 13 at 9:57 pm
I’m going to bed. Some sql.yippee may come later.

blogstrop

10 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
Hadley ”very quickly” sat down.

From Jeff on the LP thread:

Ray Hadley: physical coward.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 10:13 pm
Abbott on 60 minutes was ok.

The interview was atrocious. Hayes was shocking and made a massive fuss about women’s issues, gay marriage and what Abbott said 30 years ago.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 10:14 pm
Number Of U.S. Gun Makers Refusing Sales To Gov’t In ‘Firearms Equality Movement’ Triples In Two Weeks

I saw an estimate that this represented about 2/3 of manufacturers by numbers. No idea of the veracity of that claim; I suspect it is fairly rough.

Driftforge

10 Mar 13 at 10:14 pm
The viciousness of the Labor-obedient Courier Mail sprang out rudely in today’s edition. Don’t have the hard copy in front of me now but a photograph was captioned, “Tony Abbott with his lesbian sister, Christine Foster.”

Technically, this is illegal.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 10:16 pm
But the segment was awful.

It was a hatchet job.

Do people buy it?

Given the 60% who say he “hasn’t changed’ – then YES.

Monopoly leftist ‘journalism’ is still very powerful

JamesK

10 Mar 13 at 10:17 pm
Hayes was shocking and made a massive fuss about […] what Abbott said 30 years ago.

So, what Gillard did and said twenty years to help her leman, the fraudster, steal many thousands of dollars may be investigated by 60 Minutes?

Deadman

10 Mar 13 at 10:25 pm
So, what Gillard did and said twenty years to help her leman, the fraudster, steal many thousands of dollars may be investigated by 60 Minutes?

It should but Gillard’s incident is a potentially criminal matter that could lead to charges and was relevant to today because of the misappropriation of union money in more recent cases.

Abbott’s story is irrelevant.

Andrew

10 Mar 13 at 10:27 pm
Tom 8:58 pm

How much are you contributing to the coffers of The Cat?

kae

10 Mar 13 at 10:29 pm
It is up to Sinc how he runs his blog, but I object to the screen that blames WordPress for the frequent outages.

I follow many WordPress blogs, and this is the only one that regularly crashes.

johanna

10 Mar 13 at 10:31 pm
Abbott’s story is irrelevant.

And therefore not sub judice and fair game for a beat up.

Cato the Elder

10 Mar 13 at 10:32 pm
Gillard’s alleged wrongdoings, though (perhaps, at last) being properly investigated by the police, are not yet officially sub judice; until she’s prosecuted we’re free to discuss the many misdeeds of our mendacious Prima Meretrix without interfering with any trial.

Deadman

10 Mar 13 at 10:41 pm
The homosexual lobby – an increasingly thuggish group of fascists of whom almost everyone in public life is now terrified (what I call the fag hag effect) – doesn’t care what Abbott says about the ‘charge’ of ‘homophobia’ (an attitude invented by the homosexual lobby itself). They only care that he is being asked about this ‘prejudice’ and that he feels compelled to explain himself. The process is the victory. Affirmed is the notion that there is such a problematic prejudice, that it is endemic, that it must be crushed and that anyone who opposes such enormities as homosexual ‘marriage’ must be made to confess and expiate this transgression in the only way the homosexual lobby deems possible: namely, complete capitulation to their agenda and wacko obsessions.

C.L.

10 Mar 13 at 10:42 pm
And therefore not sub judice and fair game for a beat up.

How often have you seen 60 minutes aggressively interviewe Gillard on her memebership and presidency of Australian Union of Students (AUS)?

The AUS was then totally dominated by the extreme left. In 1983 — the year she was elected AUS president — an AUS annual council defeated heavily a call to oppose "all acts of terrorism and political violence" (AUS Annual Council 1983: motion N28).
Furthermore, the AUS annual council declined to recognise the rights of religious clubs and societies at universities to "express their views on campus" or to have access to campus facilities (AUS Annual Council 1983: motion N34). The AUS declared 1983 to be the International Year of the Lesbian.
It also adopted a policy on prostitution which said, in part: "Prostitution takes many forms and is not only the exchange of money for sex. … Prostitution in marriage is the transaction of sex in return for love, security and house-keeping." (Quoted by Helen Trinca, The Australian, April 6, 1984, p.7).

Or maybe her membership of the Socialist Alliance? (long after finishing uni):

From 1984 until 1993, Ms Gillard became a prominent figure in the militant left Socialist Forum, which had recently been formed by disaffected members of the Communist Party of Australia and Labor's left-wing. It sought, among other things, to remove Australia from the ANZUS alliance and to twin Melbourne with Leningrad (re-named St Petersburg since the fall of communism).
Julia Gillard has made light of her youthful radicalism, and has been painstakingly careful to present herself as a moderate. It is worth remembering, however, what she once wrote for the Socialist Forum on how the extreme Left could advance its agenda by giving "strategic support for Labor governments".
She said: "We need to recognise the only possibility for major social change is under a long period of Labor administration. Within that administration the Left needs to be willing to participate to shape political outcomes, recognising the need to except (sic) often unpalatable compromises in the short term to bolster the prospect of future advance."

JamesK

10 Mar 13 at 10:46 pm
The homosexual lobby – an increasingly thuggish group of fascists of whom almost everyone in public life is now terrified

It’s why I have some time for our Sharia loving brothers. They will stand up to them.

Infidel Tiger

10 Mar 13 at 11:03 pm
Be careful what you wish for, IT – or they will have your wife wearing a head-to-foot sack and circumcise you if you haven’t been already. They might (depending on their background) decide to circumcise and sew up your wife as well.

The AUS thing is not well understood, and I have a bit of inside information that might help.

AUS was financed by two things: compulsory student union fees, of which a portion was paid to AUS; and even more importantly, AUS Travel.

AUS Travel contributed more to the budget than student fees in the 1970s. It was one of the first cheap airline travel companies, chartering planes to London and Asia just as everyone wanted to visit those places. Every campus had an AUS Travel office. The AUS offices in the 1970s were half politics, half Travel.

There were inevitable culture clashes, but everyone was rolling in clover, so they were smoothed over.

The Nimbin (Aquarius) Festival was ripped off big time by various hippies, but it didn’t matter. Rivers of gold were flowing in.

It was the classic leftist paradigm – they depended on pigdog capitalists for their money, while reviling them at every turn.

I don’t know what was happening by the time Julia and her pals got in during the 80s, but do know that other operators moved in on the AUS Travel model and chipped away at their market share. They were in decline by then.

Names have been left out to avoid Sinc getting sued. Of course, it is on the public record that Ian Macdonald (aka Sir Lunchalot) was the Maoist-backed Education Vice President of AUS in 1973.

It is worth recording that the activities of AUS were for many years subsidised by travel entrepreneurs of the kind that leftists loathe. The head and mainspring of the travel business was a chap called Gregor Macaulay.

johanna

10 Mar 13 at 11:34 pm
I follow many WordPress blogs, and this is the only one that regularly crashes.

I’ve moved this site to $250/month WordPress specialists who couldn’t get it to go at all. WordPress.com won’t take us on for less than $500 a month for each site in the Ozblogistan network.

WordPress and MySQL are toxic combination, a pile of poorly written dung formed by monkeys flinging shit at a server until something stuck. I loathe them both with the power of a thousand exploding suns.

If you know a good WordPress host who doesn’t die because of a piddly 500k row comments table, let me know. I’m sick to fucking death of chasing around after this godawful junk trying to work out what dumb thing has broken.

Jacques Chester

10 Mar 13 at 11:40 pm
toxic combination, a pile of poorly written dung formed by monkeys flinging shit at a server until something stuck

.

Oh come on, Jacques. The ALP couldn’t have been involved in that… could they?

kae

10 Mar 13 at 11:45 pm
I know I shouldn’t blame the tool. I’ve always been the common element.

On the other hand, various Best WordPress Hosts haven’t got it to work properly.

It just really gets up my nostrils that it’s 2013 and stuff breaks. At all.

Jacques Chester

10 Mar 13 at 11:49 pm
Sorry, Jacques, but it’s a typical nerd’s response.

I don’t care about the lousy software – and I don’t doubt a word that you say. That’s not the point.

The fact is, every time I get a “WordPress is broken” message, I go to other WordPress blogs and, as usual, they are working just fine.

johanna

10 Mar 13 at 11:53 pm
Well at this point I am sincerely trying to gather together two fucks about what you think the point is.

Jacques Chester

10 Mar 13 at 11:56 pm
Still trying. No luck so far.

Tell me if you find something on that on the other wordpress sites.

Jacques Chester

10 Mar 13 at 11:59 pm
Oh, you’re upset by my tone? Here, let me call the manager.

Jacques Chester

11 Mar 13 at 12:05 am
Hello, I’m the manager. Here’s your refund:

Jacques Chester

11 Mar 13 at 12:05 am
LOL

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 12:07 am
Honestly.

I fucking hate wordpress.

I like the Cat, I like Club Troppo, I like Skepticlawyer, I even find that LP is interesting or at least amusing to read from time to time.

But I hate wordpress. I tried to make it go away with money but even the pros can’t get Ozblogistan to run right.

The only other option is $500/mth with wordpress.com VIP and I don’t have the kind of money. Do you? Feel free to stump it up, then I will take all complaints seriously.

You will forgive me if I am grumpy because have just wiled away my Sunday afternoon not on books, not on entertainment, not on my own projects, but on working out which turd in the bucket of shit is misbehaving so that you can enjoy the exciting life of a person who bitches about it.

If you want to pay me to do all this, fine. My long term contract rate is available on application. You will need to get in line behind my other customers, my working hours are fully booked for the next 6 months and I am running Ozblogistan in my spare time.

Jacques Chester

11 Mar 13 at 12:09 am
Thanks Jacques.

Ripper

11 Mar 13 at 12:18 am
Re our First Bloke (doesn’t it make you cringe when you read that) and his email to Gale, re Abbott. I’m just curious about the game he went to, the blackfella round. I won’t use the word indigenous, because it’s blacks only that get to play in a certain side, not our indigenous folk.
You see, I am indigenous to this country, but even if I was good enough, and 30 years younger, I could never get a run, because I am the wrong shade.
Also, I think that the blackfella round is racist and very paternalistic and tokenistic to boot, plus a few more istics that I can’t think of at present.
Seriously, do they expect us, well, me at least, I can’t speak for others, to take it all seriously when they have a more white than black blackfella, waving twigs around, smoke billowing around its ears, prancing around in a possum skin suit, the obligatory white beard (unless it’s a sheila), with a cowboy hat on, well, a headband, or maybe a bandanna a la Pirate Pete, welcoming me, and you all, including itself, seeing as he or she has heaps of white in him or herself as well, to my own country.
It is a sad and very sorry joke. Especially when all this patronising tokenism does very little for all those beautiful kids being raped and sodomised on those disgusting black communities. Nor does it stop women being bashed and occasionally murdered, or clean up the filth and squalor that is an abject embarrassment to people living in the 21st century.
I take umbrage being welcomed to my own bloody country, and guess what, these blackfellas aren’t doing it out of the goodness of their heart either. Oh no, only when the money is forthcoming will they don the possum skin and daub a few spots of ochre on the scone, and bloated, alcohol soaked body.
How about we just play bloody football and call everybody who is Australian an Australian and see how we get on. We’re Australian first and foremost, and that is all I want to be. Maybe I am a white, heterosexual, agnostic/atheist, conservative male, who does not work, nor have I done for over 16 years, full-time anyway, the odd picking or tractoring job about 14 years ago, but never had my handout for welfare and never will, but I classify as Australian, who spends most of his time now in Thailand.

Peter55

11 Mar 13 at 12:40 am
You’re doing a great job jacques seriously stick up a paypal donation link so we chip in. a cash influx will take the edge off having to do this stuff

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 12:40 am
Jacques, you sound like a cranky mummyblogger who has missed her nail appointment because of technical problems.

It’s not WordPress, because every other WordPress blog that I frequent (all self-financed) works almost all of the time, without drama.

I used to supervise IT guys like you. They were in a constant state of rage. What I learned was that the calm people who asked questions like “why does this site keep crashing?” and fixed it were by far the best people to have on the team.

Those that spat the dummy and regarded users as nuisances were the ones to get rid of.

johanna

11 Mar 13 at 12:44 am
Oh, forgot what my initial post was going to be about. I get going on tangents and as Jim Carrey would say, ‘Somebody stop me’.
Re Mathieson. Yes, he might be a bogan, a piece of white trash made good, and the same can be said of gillard, but he is on a good wicket. Gets tickets to whatever he desires, perquisites galore, nobody says boo to him if he looks like white trash when in the Chairman’s box at the Gabba for the cricket and some of the members or guests want to complain about the dress code, but dare not because of what it is, the First Bogan.
If gillard does give him the flick I am wondering if there is a pre-nup involved, not giving him a brass razoo if the relationship is dissolved within 10 years, or maybe he gets a little stipend for each year spent with the harridan.
I’m actually hoping that there is no pre-nup and he goes her for everything he can get. No children to muddy the waters, and maybe, with a good (read sleazebag) lawyer, he can go for more money for his kids. Hey, it’s worth a try.
Not that I am into that sort of marital squabbling, I believe in almost equitable splitting of the goods, with the parent having custody gaining a little extra, and of course the child support, but seeing as it is gillard involved, I shall be a little hypocritical here and hope she gets skinned.
Not that he is worth a cracker, although, if he lived in The States, that’s what he’d be called.

Peter55

11 Mar 13 at 12:51 am
Big sense of “entitlement” coming through there Johanna.

Computers have the effect of enraging a lot of the time.

Ripper

11 Mar 13 at 12:55 am
Jacques Chester, thank you.

I see the frustrations with which you are grappling, I disagree with the critics bemoaning the system failures (without knowledge of all the things behind them) and I appreciate your efforts. Catallaxy is a good place to be.

Count the complainants, then count all your participants here and attribute only the same proportion of your time paying any regard to them.

Mick Gold Coast QLD

11 Mar 13 at 1:05 am
I apologise for getting a bit heated. Any personal aspersions were uncalled for, and unconstructive.

Still, other WordPress sites seem to keep motoring, and I think that the recurrent screen that blames them raises the question of what Tony Abbott’s role is.

johanna

11 Mar 13 at 1:13 am
“Re our First Bloke (doesn’t it make you cringe when you read that) and his email to Gale, re Abbott. …”

Plainly said, clearly said and well said Peter55

Mick Gold Coast QLD

11 Mar 13 at 1:24 am
“Still, other WordPress sites seem to keep motoring”

True. But not all blogs are created equal. How many of those other WordPress sites have a comparable load to deal with?

“I used to supervise IT guys like you.”

I’m guessing you don’t know the first thing about Jacques, or IT.

Jarrah

11 Mar 13 at 1:26 am
What a pathetic, silly little organisation the ADF is.

I hate to agree with you C.L., but when I was in (oh no, not one of those back in my day tales), we were a military, not some quasi civilian mob like it is now. But I do agree with your sentiment.
What many people, read ‘progressive’ idiots, don’t realise, is that the military is a separate entity to whatever else goes on in civvy street.
The military has its own rules and laws, with many differences for the different services, and civil jurisprudence cannot work, unless you want to neuter the military, which has been done.
I’m not saying that military law overrides federal or state laws, most of the laws I would think are built on that, but internal laws for each service allow for a different way of judging. It’s a whole new ball game.
In the Navy if you transgressed, like being adrift from a muster, something simple and basic like that, you didn’t even go to front the XO, you could just be given a couple of hours extra work, or double timing in the heat with your .303 raised at high port arms. Nobody whinged.
I really have little idea how it is these days, but one would think that most military law now has come into line with what happens in civvy street.
And it’s not just that. Standards of living was another thing. I never lived in squalor or had inferior accommodation, it was just military style accommodation, sometimes 4 to a cabin when under training (the sheilas I’m pretty sure were only 2 to a cabin, but I could be wrong), and 5 to a cabin when undergoing Junior Recruit training, once finished you went in to 4 single cabins sharing a communal area and toilet and shower. It was great.
But now, no sailor is allowed to remain onboard after work, when serving onboard ships, they all have their own accommodation ashore. Marriedies always had married accommodation, years back much of it was little dogbox type housing or flats, but singlies either had to pay rent if they wanted to live ashore, or they paid R and Q onboard, and ate at the scran hall, or mess hall, as most would know that one better. And all sailors cost us at least $600 a week in Sydney for accommodation, at hotels and the like, I kid you not. Maybe they get a bulk booking deal, I don’t know.
It was how it was. But now, all ships are locked up at Christmas time so all the boys and girls can go home. Ships aren’t allowed to be away from their home port longer than 2 months. Or at sea longer than 3 weeks at a stretch.
I can’t confirm the validity of those last few, it’s just what mates have told me in the years since I paid off (1996).
Seriously, the military is a joke. The Navy is a taxi service in the north, and C.L. is so right about senior officers. I have written on this before. They are political animals.
For mine, and this maxim I went through all my career (23 years), the main job of any superior officer, no matter what rank, but it usually applies to senior sailors and officers, is to look after your troops before anything else. Especially during times of conflict.
But that rarely happens, the first and foremost duty of most personnel is to look after themselves, to protect their career, and many are thrown under the bus to produce this result.
It was why I resigned. Women at sea. What a joke. So much for OH&S. I realise that not all men can do it, but that should be the main standard before anybody can serve at sea. You must be able to carry someone, weighing about 180lbs, up a ladder, or two, or three, depending where you are on the ship, if they are unable to do so and the ship is on fire, or sinking.
Some women could do it, but the vast majority could not, but that doesn’t concern the powers that be.
They were told that women would go to sea, and to make it happen. Al without much forethought, it just happened, basically overnight.
And the shit sure did hit the fan.
If you join the military you must do so knowing that you are treated differently (not worse, in a legal sense, or differently or badly, not mistreated and deprived food and all that guff), you are different from those on civvy street. That is what you signed on for. But what you get is all these little shits, mostly, who have a sense of entitlement, and when things don’t go perfectly, then it’s inquiries, psychs, counselling for those nasty superior officers who just may have yelled at someone with a mocking tone. It just can’t work.
It’s ridiculous, and I am embarrassed at the way things have changed. I just wish one of the skippers of the boats in the north would tell the powers that be, that it is too dangerous to do what they do (even though it is a dangerous job) at times. Why go into danger willingly during peacetime, without at least protecting the troops to the maximum. A great example of that is the illegals boat being blown up a few years back.
So they threaten to do something, stiff shit. Heave to well away from the boat, keep all the sailors onboard, and take it from there. Let them do what they want, without sailors’ live being put at risk.
If these toerags want to harm themselves and others onboard, so be it. Take out the bungs and the ship starts sinking. That’s when the Navy goes into action, to protect lives at sea. It’s one of their jobs. Not to escort illegal interlopers into our country from beyond our coastal waters, after their mobile phone call has alerted Coastwatch, who then get on to the Navy.
Just think of those SAS blokes being charged with murder over in Afghanistan. Thank christ that didn’t eventuate, but the female lawyer general was doing her damnedest to get it done. Another liberal lawyer thinking that guns are bad.
Protect the troops at all costs before anything else. Of course I am not condoning blatant murder of innocents, I’m sure you know what I’m indicating here, but when on a battlefield they have every right to protect themselves, even if their bosses do not care.
I know I go on and I apologise, but this, to put it bluntly, irks me, to put in nicely, to the extreme. Sorry. I’ll leave it there.

Peter55

11 Mar 13 at 3:13 am
http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/hold-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx

Only 5% of US republicans believe Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. 58% believe the human species is less than 10,000 years old.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 3:16 am
The homosexual lobby – an increasingly thuggish group of fascists of whom almost everyone in public life is now terrified (what I call the fag hag effect) – doesn’t care what Abbott says about the ‘charge’ of ‘homophobia’ (an attitude invented by the homosexual lobby itself). They only care that he is being asked about this ‘prejudice’ and that he feels compelled to explain himself. The process is the victory.

Quite so, CL. I’ve read the transcript and Liz Hayes reveals herself as just another production-line leftist media tart, but it was useful media exposure for TA. It’s getting harder for the Abbott-haters to be taken seriously.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 3:52 am
Still, other WordPress sites seem to keep motoring, and I think that the recurrent screen that blames them raises the question of what Tony Abbott’s role is.

Other wordpress sites are not nearly the size of Catallaxy.

You obviously have no idea of what it costs to host a popular website. Jacques is doing it for free, please shut up.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 4:43 am
Barrie Cassidy grills Scott Morrison with 21 questions on ABC1′s Insiders, March 3:

BARRIE Cassidy: Now Scott Morrison, how do you plan to notify residents when asylum-seekers move into the neighbourhood, how do you do that? How will you do it? How will you notify that asylum-seekers move into the neighbourhood? Is it a letter-box drop, how do you do it? . . . Is that when the letter-box drop comes in? Why do residents then need to know? Why do they need to know? What sets asylum-seekers apart? Why do they need to know they’re living next door to an asylum-seeker? . . . Are you not overreacting to one case of an alleged indecent assault?

Morrison: I think the overreaction is on the hysteria to my comments.

Only 12 leisurely questions for Brendan O’Connor. ABC1′s Insiders yesterday:

BARRIE Cassidy: Beyond the anecdotal, are you able to give us any documented evidence to support the need for a tightening of the scheme? . . .

Brendan O’Connor: As I said during the last two weeks, there are over 100 sanctions already . . .

Cassidy: . . . So are you saying then that employers are bringing these people in so that they can employ them on reduced wages?

O’Connor: I’m saying we don’t have sufficient protections in place to ensure that this scheme is used for the purposes it was constructed.

Cassidy: Now it’s true, isn’t it though, that companies involved in this face a real compliance hassle from now on?

O’Connor: Well let me just say, let me tell you the lethal cocktail I’m witnessing . . .

Cassidy: OK, in Victoria, where you are right now, of course, did the Liberals in Victoria give you a lesson on how to change leaders in a bloodless way?

O’Connor: (Laughs) Well, it’s been only a few days.

…but Pew Research measured the interviews and as both sides of politics were allocated about the same amount time so the dishonest Lefties can claim there is no bias on the ABC.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 8:19 am
Some of the newbies are damn bossy

Tal

11 Mar 13 at 8:26 am
FFS, Labor really has the dog whistle between the lips and is going full leftard…

Mr O’Connor said yesterday it was not fair to Australians to allow the 457 visa category to become a “mainstay” of the nation’s migrant intake, as he stepped up his assault on the Coalition for backing the scheme. His claims, which echo the union movement’s alarm about temporary workers applying for residency, fly in the face of advice from migration experts who back the link between the 457 program and the permanent migration intake.

Coalition immigration spokesman Scott Morrison said the minister was setting up a “straw man” with his claims about the growth in visa applications and that it was hypocrisy for Labor to find fault with a system it had overseen for five years.

Disgusting, when all O’Connor’s got is open ended emotive statements like “fair”, all he does is prove to the world he just another empty vessel making a lot of noise.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 8:27 am
Some of the newbies are damn bossy

LOL

Token

11 Mar 13 at 8:27 am
Radio says women increasingly going to gaol for viokence.
Can Scitt promise ti warn me when a women moves into mu neughbourhood.? I am particularly keen to be told where the “fit” ones are, as Ali G would put it.

WhaleHunt Fun

11 Mar 13 at 8:35 am
Radio says women increasingly going to gaol for violence.
Can Scott Morrison promise to warn me when a women moves into my neighbourhood.? I am particularly keen to be told where the “fit” ones are, as Ali G would put it.

WhaleHunt Fun

11 Mar 13 at 8:37 am
Paul Sheehan notes Shorten is on the move:

As for Shorten’s own behaviour lately, he has been manic. Privately, he has been counting heads. Publicly, he has been seeking to mobilise both the left and the right of the union base, the 18 per cent of the workforce given such priority by the federal government.

In recent weeks Shorten has given a speech to AWU members in which he said he carries his AWU card around Parliament House as a source of inspiration, and delivered a speech to a ”militancy conference” of the Maritime Union of Australia, which is about to embark on negotiations involving a massive stream of resource projects.

At the conference the union’s WA secretary Chris Cain said MUA members should be willing to ”break the law” if necessary to achieve the union’s goals. Shorten said not one word to distance himself from Cain’s comments.

Several months ago, Shorten was rebuked by a High Court judge, Dyson Heydon, after he intervened in a High Court case, Barclay v Bendigo TAFE, in support of a union official, a ministerial intervention that Justice Heydon described as ”partisan”.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 8:47 am
I recognise that it is a privilege to be able to post here and not a right. Many thanks to Jacques for making it possible.

Cold-Hands

11 Mar 13 at 8:48 am
Only 5% of US republicans believe Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. 58% believe the human species is less than 10,000 years old.

Bullshit Yobbo. Go back and read the fucking blurb again.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 8:49 am
Peter55

I hate to agree with you C.L., but when I was in

try that shit somewhere else sport, perhaps you need to crawl back to Bolt’s blog.

You either agree with someone or you don’t, you idiot.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 8:54 am
Er…. JC, I think Peter55 was expressing regret for the state the ADF is in.
He has nothing against C.L. per se.

Steve at the Pub

11 Mar 13 at 9:13 am
Mr O’Connor said yesterday it was not fair to Australians to allow the 457 visa category to become a “mainstay” of the nation’s migrant intake, as he stepped up his assault on the Coalition for backing the scheme.

Umm…who approves the 457 applications? Is it some alien or is it this government? What a grandstanding farce.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 9:21 am
Michael Smith throws to Bob Carr and Morris Iemma squabbling as to who was responsible for Eddie Obeid:

Senator Carr, now the Foreign Affairs Minister, has accused Mr Iemma, his successor as premier, of a serious error by allowing Mr Obeid ”special status” in his government.

”I’m sure that Morris Iemma, a very decent – decent and honest figure – would reflect that it was a cardinal mistake to allow Obeid that special status and privilege,” Senator Carr says in comments that will go to air on Monday night on the ABC program Four Corners.

…

Mr Iemma rejected Mr Carr’s assessment, insisting he had no special access. ”He had a status all right: cabinet minister, conferred on him by Bob Carr,” Mr Iemma said of Mr Obeid.

”I don’t know what special status he’s referring to. He was a cabinet minister in Bob’s government. He was a backbencher in my government.”

I would have thought it was a bit early for Four Corners to cover this story given that ICAC is still examining the matter, but no doubt the ALPBC wants the story gone and forgotten by the time the election draws near.

Cold-Hands

11 Mar 13 at 9:25 am
Im with Carr on this assessment…Im not so sure Iemma was / is as decent as he looked. He comes from the south side of Sydney. He has been tutored in the Rockdale system of management.

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:33 am
Sometimes you feel like putting your boot through the screen:

The question Tubbsy Jones should have asked:
“Is it fair to Australians to allow the “refugees” sans documentation category to become the mainstay of the nation’s migrant intake?”

Steve at the Pub

11 Mar 13 at 9:33 am
Gab on the 457s I disagree with you. Why should 457s be flown in when there are not enough jobs for Australian kids to get started (and they have cut back spending on Tafe) in Victoria (yes liberals).
As for the 457 issue – this was decided by both Fed Labor and agreed to with Victorian liberals is my understanding and on this
they are bot as bad as each other and a reason why some people like myself get pissed off with both parties.
So we apparently have to pay our taxes to house boat people and other illegal immigrants who cant work, then go on welfare whilst our STUPID governments let in 457s and our own kids are at uni because there arent enough jobs out there.

Australian citizens come first in my view but you wouldnt know it looking at both our stupid and immoral main political parties. Greed is ruling their roosts – both parties.

Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:40 am
Im with Carr on this assessment
Another example of your impaired judgement Aliice. Under Carr, Obeid was a cabinet minister with all the power and authority that implies. Iemma forced him to the backbench, but by then, the damage had been done.

Cold-Hands

11 Mar 13 at 9:43 am
Aliice, there are some professions that Australia does not train people in. For instance there just isn’t sufficient Australian expertise in oil & gas extraction, or in some engineering disciplines.
Fibre optics is another. Other issues surrounding it aside, the NBN wouldn’t be happening without temporary entrants, as Australia does not have the skills in some critical areas.

If the government is not going to train Australians to a job-ready standard in certain skills, it is a bit rich for that same govt to then complain about those skills being sought elsewhere.

Steve at the Pub

11 Mar 13 at 9:46 am
In a situation repeated in regional towns across Australia, in the grand old Queensland country town of Charters Towers it is foreigners who fill the void where locals cannot or will not go.

Sri Lankan mechanic Reinzie De Silva, 28, arrived in the gold and cattle town of about 8000, 1400km northwest of Brisbane, to pick up the tools at the local Toyota dealership five months ago.
…
Mr De Silva is one of a group of Sri Lankan workers who have made a home in Charters Towers, filling ongoing workplace skills shortages.

Charters Towers Toyota had struggled to fill the vacancy — along with three others in nearby Townsville — for more than a year until it recruited a handful of Sri Lankans.
…
Deputy Mayor Wally Brewer said specialist workers in local jobs were a necessity, especially because of the drain of skilled staff to nearby mines.

“Any politicians who pretend we’re not in an international market are fooling themselves and everyone around,” he said.

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/sri-lankan-migrants-on-457s-help-keep-a-small-town-running/story-e6frg6n6-1226594314826

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 9:46 am
LOL Jacques is funny up there when in a very grumpy mood.
Thanks for all your efforts Jacques on a Sunday!! and especially whilst being called a nerd in the process…

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:48 am
Some people !

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:48 am
Whats ok in Charters Towers isnt the same for Geelong or CBDs in major cities Gab BUT when this door opens CBD businesses are going be noisily clamouring and scamming and donating to political parties and scumbag politicians for their right to their share of 457 visa workers as well.

Be careful what you wish for and welcome to America where you can buy the best law you can get.

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:52 am
Alice perhaps you should complain to this current government, you know this government that approves the 457 visa applications.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 9:53 am
SATP
Dont swallow the garbage

“Fibre optics is another. Other issues surrounding it aside, the NBN wouldn’t be happening without temporary entrants, as Australia does not have the skills in some critical areas.”

If there was such a demand out there Steve, the companies would have marched into the unis demanded 2nd year electrical engineers like my son and offered to fund the rest of his studies part time.
Thats not happening. They are still demanding high GPAs for no or low paid internships…and the engineering trainees are all there in our uni.

So what is it they really want SATP – skills or cheap labour from their 457s?

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:57 am
“Whats ok in Charters Towers isnt the same for Geelong or CBDs in major cities Gab…”

Why not?

Tracey

11 Mar 13 at 9:58 am
Heh.

If it were Israel pumping human waste through the tunnels we’d have protesters all over the place screaming about the injustice, but since it’s only the Egyptians, I guess that’s okay.

Gaza Strip – Gazans are crying foul after Egypt stepped up its campaign to wipe out an underground network of transportation tunnels by blasting raw sewage down them, sometimes with deadly results for Palestinian workers.

Some 2,000 men and boys work in the tunnel trade in the Gaza Strip. But over the past three months, more than 80 percent have lost the only work and benefits available in besieged Gaza, which remains stuck in an Israeli blockade.

That occurred after the government of Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi ordered the destruction of the underground transportation network. As part of that effort, the military began dumping raw sewage into the passageways.

It’s the most serious – and arguably the most dangerous – attempt by Egypt to close down the tunnels since 2006, when Palestinians began digging the warrens after Israel sealed off its borders with Gaza following Hamas’ election victory.

An estimated 30 percent of goods that reach Gaza’s 1.7 million Palestinians come through the tunnels.

Never fear, though, a paragraph later Israel still manages to cop the blame.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:19 am
Pardon me Gab but the 457 visa program was initially set up by the Howard Government and the current government continues to approve its use.
I was careful to be unbiased in my post above you need to re read it.

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 10:47 am
This government has had five years to abolish the 457 program, Alice. Why is it now they’re complaining about the program? Hmm? Could the union push have something to do with it? Blaming Howard is very childish.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 10:51 am
SMH forgets to include the usual disclaimer on any Peter Hartcher article,

Written and authorised by Kevin Rudd on behalf of the ~~Australian Labor Party~~ himself.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 10:59 am
Pardon me Gab but the 457 visa program was initially set up by the Howard Government and the current government continues to approve its use.
I was careful to be unbiased in my post above you need to re read it.

Two years ago Gillard thought the 457 scheme was absolutely wonderful and doubled the length of a Visa from 3 to 6 years and raised the number of visas from a steady 75,000 to 125,000.

So yeah. You should really be asking Gillard the question about why it’s suddenly the most awful thing on the planet one month after she went and kissed the ring of the AWU in Jupiters Casino.

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 11:01 am
http://www.gallup.com/poll/155003/hold-creationist-view-human-origins.aspx

Only 5% of US republicans believe Darwin’s theory of evolution by natural selection. 58% believe the human species is less than 10,000 years old.

93.7% of fools believe that poll to be accurate.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 11:02 am
No shit Sherlock.

Fukushima Radiation Proves Less Deadly Than Feared

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-03-10/fukushima-radiation-proves-less-deadly-than-feared.html

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:06 am
Amazing new tech on the way

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/03/05/seeing-the-invisible-theres-an-app-for-that/

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:12 am
Whats ok in Charters Towers isnt the same for Geelong or CBDs in major cities Gab

Sigh. More government intervention? Are you talking about special economic zones for remote areas?

I thought our government came out strongly against such a policy.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 11:14 am
Amazing new tech on the way

I would love to be able to put on Google glasses with that app installed at my next poker game.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 11:19 am
Happy 100th birthday Canberra. What a stupid fucking idea that was.

Anybody want to take a guess at what 100 years of living away from home allowances, relocation allowances, loadings and other public service pork has cost the country? Not to mention the impact of trying to administer the country from the isolationist bubble of a “company” town.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 11:29 am
Gee, it seems a lot of red cordial has been consumed here over the last couple of days.

Depending on how Newspoll goes tonight, it could well get even worse.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 11:42 am
Depending on how Newspoll goes tonight, it could well get even worse.

PvO wrote on Twitter that Newspoll should be good for Labor this week – nobody has been arrested since the last one.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:50 am
Gary Gray adjusts his deckchair,

In my view, there is no doubt that the continued speculation and nonsense and flim-flam and all the stuff around that is simply that – it dies away. Julia is the enduring Leader of the Labor Party and that’s how it will be.

He must be taking media lessons from The Legover Man.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 11:57 am
Julia is the enduring Leader of the Labor Party and that’s how it will be.

God, I hope so. Love from We Are Us. XXX. I have a bouquet of flowers behind my back. I’ll give it to you on September 14.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 12:07 pm
Steve, nice of you to stick your head back in.
I haven’t noticed you around these parts since the other day when you disappeared after being called to account for being a tax eating waste of space.
Let’s make it clear moron, if you are not in paid employment and rely on the government to pay your way, we (taxpayers) pay you.
The stuff that appears in your account every fortnight does not come from the magical money tree, it comes from people like me.
It really sticks in my craw that indolent fucks like you spend all day sitting on your arse in front of a computer going out of your way to annoy people.
You should be grateful to us and give thanks every day.
Now, fuck off again.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

11 Mar 13 at 12:10 pm
God, I hope so. Love from We Are Us. XXX. I have a bouquet of flowers behind my back. I’ll give it to you on September 14.

We all pray the Red Yabbi keep delivering her steady supply of gaffes through to the last possible day in November when she finally faces the people at the polls.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 12:10 pm
Approximately 98 percent od Democrats believe that a foetus could be an aardvark.

Or human.

“We just don’t know,” they say.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 12:13 pm
Abbott “wacky” says Mark Latham – the man who shaved his head and hid in a motel after the 2004 election.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 12:14 pm
Jacques, it’s blindingly obvious to me that Johanna has no idea what is being talked about. For someone to find another wordpress blog and claim equivalency is ignorant in the extreme. It’s like bitching at a mechanic for a broken Ford when others are still driving past.

Memo for those who don’t understand : there’s a *tiny* bit more to delivering a blog than the software type.

Supervised IT types. I can only imagine. What an extraordinary statement to make, one that exposes ignorance and fear of dealing with things one doesn’t even remotely understand.

brc

11 Mar 13 at 12:20 pm
Failed priest, extremist left-wing lunatic – and turd – Paul Collins, briefs journalists in Rome that Cardinal Pell is kind of a child rapist.

Well, not really – but they won’t know the difference.

Cardinal George Pell reportedly has no chance of becoming Pope after his Australian opponents filled in the media and cardinals about the Sydney archbishop’s history of dealing with sex abuse allegations.

Australian commentator, Paul Collins, says progressive Catholics have lobbied overseas journalists and voting cardinals to make sure they are aware of a 2002 inquiry into allegations against the Sydney archbishop.

The inquiry, headed by independent commissioner, Alex Southwell, QC, cleared Dr Pell of allegations he molested a boy, in 1961, during a camp at Phillip Island, in Victoria.

But Dr Collins, a former priest, has told Fairfax: ‘He has no chance.’

Dr Collins said another problem for the Cardinal is that his patrons, the former Pope and other influential cardinals, have lost power.

‘In Italy, without patrons, you’re gone.’

http://www.skynews.com.au/national/article.aspx?id=853306

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 12:21 pm
Gab, Bolt might be interested in Collins’ shocking and evil conduct.

The story deserves a wider audience.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 12:22 pm
CL, Collins does not say in that report that he is part of the group that lobbied the Cardinals.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 12:28 pm
The Age quotes the evil Collins on the same story:

Pell could be a child rapist…

”The judge never cleared Pell and that has rendered Pell irrelevant. He has no chance,” Dr Collins, a former priest, said.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 12:31 pm
Considering how busy the Pope Emeritus was when it came to cleaning out the dross I wouldn’t be talking too soon about Cdl Pell not having any patrons.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 12:43 pm
In news which should surprise no-one, “UK’s Centre for Ecology and Hydrology says rainforests will survive climate change”:
The very silly Prof. Flannery’s awarmist scaremongering lacks scientific support!

[N]ew research, led by the UK’s Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, used 22 climate modelling computer systems and programs incorporating plant biology to explore the response of tropical forests in the Americas, Africa and Asia to greenhouse-gas-induced climate change. [...]
“We find the possibility of climate-induced damage to tropical rainforests in the period to year 2100 … might be lower than some earlier studies.”

What, plants which depend on carbon dioxide might prefer more carbon dioxide? No!

“There is also increasing evidence that the long-term temperature response of respiration (in plants) is dynamic, capable of thermal acclimation (adaption to changing temperatures). […]
“There are suggestions that photosynthesis can also acclimate to rising temperatures, although the extent to which this might occur in tropical forest species remains unknown.”

What, plants which have coped with massive changes of climate over the ages might be able to cope with a little change?

The research said rainforests would not be destroyed by 2100 even in a “business-as-usual” scenario where industry does not cut emissions.

Might not be destroyed? But, but, but, “business-as-usual” is evil, and wicked emissions must be stopped, somehow!
Oh, dear. We’ll just have to find some degree of comfort from awarmist yells that the cuter animals are in amazing danger from any slight change over the next century.

Deadman

11 Mar 13 at 12:58 pm
Mark Latham and John Hewson should form a polical lobbying firm. Politicians would pay good money to find out that they didn’t agree with anything they were proposing to do.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 1:06 pm
Ease up Huck. He might be a centrelink specialist but he and his wife steal bread on the weekends at markets. SfB isn’t just a layabout do nothing. He has a skerrick of initiative.

Tiny Dancer

11 Mar 13 at 1:06 pm
Education Minister Chris Bowen releases the new Master Plan to make Teachers more worthy of their pay.
During their university course, the student teachers will be assessed, and if their literacy and numeracy are not up to scratch, they’ll be tended to by the university with remedial classes.
Questions: Why are they not being told while at school that the basic requirement for entry to many faculties requires a bit of the ol’ RRR? Does high school now have better things to do than teach RRR? Are universities now so desperate for intake that they are lowering their standards to a level that should, if widely known, be regarded as scandalous?

blogstrop

11 Mar 13 at 1:11 pm
It is safe to assume Bowen isn’t doing anything that hasn’t already been ticked off by the teachers unions.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 1:23 pm
During their university course, the student teachers will be assessed, and if their literacy and numeracy are not up to scratch, they’ll be tended to by the university with remedial classes.

Beyond parody.

Did they not just spend 12 years of their lives in Government run schools being taught how to read and add up?

No?

They’re well versed in the Social Justice & Diversity issues of the day though.

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 1:32 pm
if their literacy and numeracy are not up to scratch, they’ll be tended to by the university with remedial classes.

Ah, the people in charge of teaching the prospective teachers (at university) will be the same teachers who already failed to teach the current teachers how to teach the prospective teachers.
Until such time as the education faculties are staffed with competent teachers instead of incompetent ideologues, there can be no improvement in teaching.

Deadman

11 Mar 13 at 2:09 pm
Paul Collins: turd.

”The judge never cleared Pell and that has rendered Pell irrelevant. He has no chance,” Dr Collins, a former priest, said.

Facts:

Justice Southwell concluded:

[B]earing in mind the… very long delay, some valid criticism of the complainant’s credibility, the lack of corroborative evidence and the sworn denial of the respondent, I find I am not ‘satisfied that the complaint has been established’.

After Pell was cleared, it was revealed that the accuser, who was a convicted criminal, admitted to the inquiry that Dr Bernard Barrett from the group Broken Rites said “he could write a terrific victim impact statement” that would earn at least $50,000. Pell pushed for the release of the full inquiry transcript, stating that: “there is no mud to stick because I have been exonerated. There will no doubt be people who prefer to tale a bleak view but there is nothing I can do about that.”

Terry O’Gorman, the president of the Australian Council for Civil Liberties, stated in an interview with the ABC Program “The World Today” on Wednesday 21 August 2002, that the reaction to the accusations against Archbishop Pell were “hysterical and unbalanced”, and went completely against “the principles of presumption of innocence”.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Pell#Accusation_of_sexual_abuse

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 2:34 pm
At press club function in Washington, Obama thanks press for all that they do for him. The dinner was closed to cameras.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 2:50 pm
Krugman smackdown from the left, though you might not like the alternative remedy
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jeffrey-sachs/professor-krugman-and-cru_b_2845773.html

Pedro

11 Mar 13 at 2:52 pm
Further proof that inbreeding can create terrific racehorses and terrible children:

http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/world/prince-charles-and-prince-philip-have-divergent-views-on-the-environment/story-fnb64oi6-1226594752865

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 3:09 pm
More manipulation from our great leaders. Apologies if someone has already posted this link elsewhere.

http://www.news.com.au/national-news/fee-hike-to-knock-out-competition-at-federal-election/story-fncynjr2-1226594801648

Tracey

11 Mar 13 at 3:19 pm
Tracey

A good quality statement and discussion on the fees and the more important numbers to nominate is here at Antony Green’s blog.

I think the money is irrelevant, the change to nomination numbers is a little harder to support.

Entertaining to note Antony had it up on 21 Feb.

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 3:41 pm
Krugman smackdown from the left, though you might not like the alternative remedy

Spends the whole column trying to take down Krugman and then throws in populist, ill-considered and unsupported
remedies’ at the end.

What a waste.

Driftforge

11 Mar 13 at 3:43 pm
More manipulation from our great leaders. Apologies if someone has already posted this link elsewhere.

Fascist Watch – The Second Month:

“I am concerned that if we have more groups on the New South Wales Senate ballot paper we are going to have to supply magnifying glasses to voters,” [Labor Party] Senator Faulkner said, adding that he understood the ballot paper could not be printed any larger (meaning font size would have to get smaller).”

Therefore small parties will be banned.

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 3:44 pm
If the ALP are going to assess the emotional intelligence of teachers surely this should also be applied to the ALP itself? This would assist in weeding out borderline psychopaths, micro-managing narcissists and paranoid delusional types before they are put forward as potential Prime Ministers.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 3:48 pm
Therefore small parties will be banned.

The ALP will be banned? Good.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 3:53 pm
This would assist in weeding out borderline psychopaths, micro-managing narcissists and paranoid delusional types before they are put forward as potential Prime Ministers.

But how else do you get to be their leader?

blogstrop

11 Mar 13 at 4:28 pm
Priceless Infidel
Priceless

WhaleHunt Fun

11 Mar 13 at 4:28 pm
Surely Bill Shorten’s head will still qualify

WhaleHunt Fun

11 Mar 13 at 4:30 pm
93.7% of fools believe that poll to be accurate.

I’m sure IT can point to something debunking this survey then.

Just face it, the US religious right is crazy, and that’s why we’re into the 2nd term of Obama. Republicans need to lose the crazy if they are to be relevant next time around.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 4:52 pm
On the matter of Republicans and creationism, here’s an article citing that (and Republican anti-science generally – as their attitude to climate change further evidences) as one of the key reasons Asian Americans have deserted the party:

Which brings us to the “push” factors. The Liu affair helped push some Asian voters away from the GOP, but, in the scheme of things, that was minor. Here is what’s major: the GOP’s social intolerance (according to a Pew report last summer, Asian Americans support gay marriage by a wide margin), its anti-immigrant tone, and, perhaps most importantly, its hostility to modern disciplines like science and evolutionary biology.

As Lloyd Green, a Bush ’88 campaign counsel and later a Justice Department lawyer, wrote last week, “Asian American students tend to concentrate in the STEM jobs – sciences, technology, engineering, and mathematics.” In the workplace, a disportionate share of Asians are “a subset of high-tech America, and one thing is clear: high-tech America is not in love with the Republican party.”

In short, most Asian voters – especially the younger ones – have no patience for a party that denies manmade climate change, curbs stem cell research (as George W. Bush did), and often uses a Biblical measure to peg the age of Earth.

Menzie Chinn, an economics professor at the Robert M. LaFollette School of Public Affairs in Wisconsin, recently pointed out that Asians in this country “have a belief in progress by way of science and technology…The generation of my parents – who came from China – saw enough rigid, dogmatic ideology run amok, thank you very much.” He said that if Republicans truly want to reconnect with the Asian electorate, “they will have to think more deeply about whether the age of Earth is closer to 4000 or four billion years.”

Sounds very plausible to me…

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:07 pm
Whoops, forgot the link.

Incidentally, is there any Asian Australian participant in threads at this blog now that Jason has departed? It seems to be full of Angry White Men (of both genders.)

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:10 pm
How bad do you actually think the GOP is doing, Yobbo?

Seriously, do you know or just read Slate to tell you.

They have 30 governors which includes some pretty important vibrant states. Texas, by the way, which would be on your hate list has actually expanded employment and GDP significantly over the peak prior to the crash.

They have far more people in the state houses than the demolition party and they own the house of reps.

The differential was around 3 million votes in the presidential election.

Lots of people believe in God in America. Live with it.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 5:17 pm
Why aren’t YOU Asian, Steve? This seems to me to be a grave oversight on your part. Not very representative or inclusive of you.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 5:18 pm
Thank god commonsense has prevailed. You’re the only leader for us, Juliar. We demand you lead us to the election:

KEY supporters of Kevin Rudd believe Julia Gillard will hang on as Prime Minister in the short term at least, despite a growing sense within Labor that she will lead the party to a crushing election defeat.

As cabinet minister Gary Gray warned colleagues against disunity and “sniping” in the wake of the WA election result, Rudd backers said the ball was in Ms Gillard’s court.

“No one is pushing or organising or anything,” one source said.

“The only thing that could happen this week really is for her to come in and say ‘the position is vacant’. And I don’t think she’s going to do that.”

Ms Gillard could count on only about 40 votes in the 103 member caucus, the MP said, and a fresh Newspoll due tomorrow would focus the minds of colleagues further.

But, with Mr Rudd having pledged not to challenge, the numbers were largely irrelevant.Another Rudd supporter said it was “situation normal”.

“If you didn’t know better, you’d swear she was backing Tony Abbott herself. She could be the greatest mole that ever lived.”

A third Rudd supporter said there had been “no detectable shift” on the leadership question since the weekend’s election rout in Western Australia.

As Labor MPs return to Canberra for a fortnight of parliamentary sittings, Mr Gray said there was one unmissable message for federal Labor in Premier Colin Barnett’s convincing victory at the weekend.

“Premier Barnett, the Liberal Party and the National Party were able to work together in harmony by not sniping internally, by not backbiting, by remaining focused on good governance and good government and focusing on that, rather than on themselves,” Mr Gray told ABC radio.

Mr Gray said Ms Gillard would lead the party to the election.

“In my view, there is no doubt that the continued speculation and nonsense and flim-flam and all the stuff around that is simply that it dies away,” he said.

“Julia is the enduring leader of the Labor Party and that’s how it will be.”

The Q&A producers obviously now have hugely conflicted emotions: should they accede to Kevin’s urgent request to make an unscheduled appearance tonight to announce again that he will not run? Or will that just distract from the day’s big news of the massive swing to the Greens in Broome because of their principled stance opposing all new economic development in Australia, especially the filthy non-government money grab by the primitive Kimberley blackfellas?

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 5:20 pm
Incidentally, is there any Asian Australian participant in threads at this blog now that Jason has departed? It seems to be full of Angry White Men (of both genders.)

How the fuck would you know, you indolent, totalitarian atheist piece of abortion supporting shit?

Huckleberry Chunkwot

11 Mar 13 at 5:21 pm
Oh hi, Philipppa. How was ole crazy eyes’ talk the other night? I am sure his wife is pleased that people like you contribute enough to keep him out of the house for 6 months of year. Can you imagine living with the latin quoting bombastic twit?

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:21 pm
Abbott “wacky” says Mark Latham – the man who shaved his head and hid in a motel after the 2004 election.

That was just Mark’s improvisation of the old testament ritual of putting on sackcloth and ashes when one repented of their fuckwittery.

Splatacrobat

11 Mar 13 at 5:22 pm
Incidentally, is there any Asian Australian participant in threads at this blog now that Jason has departed? It seems to be full of Angry White Men (of both genders.)

And leftwing beta males such as yourself.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 5:22 pm
Hi Chuckelwart.

No, I don’t know. But the Asian American thing after the last US election has been discussed here before, and I just realised today that no one here ever says they can speak from that perspective personally.

I think the blog needs to go on a recruitment campaign, to be more racially inclusive.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:26 pm
How the fuck would you know~~, you indolent, totalitarian atheist piece of abortion supporting shit~~?

How to make a valid point without being an OTT arsehole.

Jarrah

11 Mar 13 at 5:26 pm
The cyclone, to be called Tim, is expected to track east across Cape York about Friday and into the Coral Sea, heading southeast.

stackja

11 Mar 13 at 5:28 pm
Catallaxy & the IPA gets a starring role again at J Quiggin’s.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:29 pm
Incidentally, is there any Asian Australian participant in threads at this blog now that Jason has departed? It seems to be full of Angry White Men (of both genders.)

SoB has to come here to insult people as no one of any background except pathetic beta male ever posts as his lilly white blog.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 5:30 pm
I think the blog needs to go on a recruitment campaign, to be more racially inclusive.

So you could attack them for their race like you attack the numerous females here for their gender, you cowardly dipshit.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 5:31 pm
Incidentally, is there any Asian Australian participant in threads at this blog

Statistically 95% of the participants should be non-Asian. Any fewer would be racist.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 5:31 pm
It’s true, Token, I have been waiting for a spirited discussion of the Wizard of Oz to start at my blog. And no, I am not a friend of Dorothy…

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:32 pm
Catallaxy & the IPA gets a starring role again at J Quiggin’s

So why would we be surprised that the Walking Dead are obsessed with the people with a life they pathetic envy?

Token

11 Mar 13 at 5:32 pm
atheist piece of abortion supporting shit?

Things some Cat commentators think are insults.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 5:34 pm
Wow Toke…

It seems Wodgie-wants-his-ETS has had a full sex change. She’s now quoting/linking Jeff Sparrow. FFS

Hasn’t she come a long way.

rog
March 11th, 2013 at 13:46 | #4
Reply | Quote

Getting it wrong seems to be a successful business model, as Jeff Sparrow notes.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 5:35 pm
Sex Discrimination Commissioner Elizabeth Broderick concedes that the Australian Human Rights Commission has no initiatives targeting men. “We have very limited resources, so our work is necessarily directed at identifying the greatest areas of gender inequality,” Broderick says. “So, while we actively engage with men and some of the men’s groups, we have not directly worked on men’s rights issues.”

Says feminist and sociologist Eva Cox: “They’re determined to be victims.”

stackja

11 Mar 13 at 5:37 pm
Nothing OTT at all Jarrah. Merely pointing out the hysterical contradictions from this self confessed “conservative Catholic” troll.
His logical fallacies and outright lies need to be brought to the attention of all newcomers to the blog just so that no one makes the mistake of believing anything that SfB claims.
Steve, unlike other far left loons like numbers, refuses to hang his true colours from the mast and this, along with his constant thread clogging, requires his life here to be made as uncomfortable as possible.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

11 Mar 13 at 5:41 pm
Just face it, the US religious right is crazy, and that’s why we’re into the 2nd term of Obama. Republicans need to lose the crazy if they are to be relevant next time around.

Funny about that because someone is suggesting the Blue coalition in the US is beginning to come apart at the edges.

Russell Meade suggests there is a Blue on Blue civil war erupting in the Blue states. Why? Because the blue model of raping the productive class to pay the pensions of the taxeaters is basically a rape and pillage ponzi scheme.

This is going to be the biggest issue in the 16 presidential election. Not who the fuck believes in God.

Some reckon US public sector unfunded pension liabilities are around $2.2 trillion.

http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/03/08/blue-civil-war-in-obamas-home-state/

By the way, Meade is an old school Demolitionist.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 5:53 pm
But how else do you get to be their leader?

Dunno. Ask Big Bill Ludwig.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 5:54 pm
Things some Cat commentators think are insults

Yobbo, you misunderstand. My issue is not that he is clearly an atheist that supports abortion, my issue is the fact that the liar professes to be a “conservative Catholic”.
He may get a ~~modicum of respect~~ less abuse and derision around here if he had the courage to hang his colours from the mast.
The fact that he continues to post here whilst maintaining this charade is worthy of insult and abuse.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

11 Mar 13 at 5:55 pm
Chuckleberry: I don’t “support” abortion, but think that the Catholic Church’s line on how governments should legislate about it is impractical; as is its attitude to contraception, the effective use of which is a pretty good way to avoid the need for abortion.

I would be more than happy for abortions to be truly rare: making them uniformly illegal and teaching people that contraception is bad is not the way to achieve that.

A large proportion of lay Catholics would agree with that.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 5:58 pm
Any chance the religion argument can be taken over to the religion thread? Please?

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 5:59 pm
The Iphone seems so yesterday.

Someone told me of a Samsung ad in the US. Two kids are standing in an Apple line waiting for the latest Apple gizmo. They get around to explaining they’re holding the place for their parents.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2291164/iPhone-facing-biggest-threat-launch-new-Samsung-Galaxy-controlled-eyes.html

Meanwhile Google stock is flying.

700 bucks a share was considered a real barrier. It’s now 831 bucks!

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:01 pm
Just face it, the US religious right is crazy, and that’s why we’re into the 2nd term of Obama. Republicans need to lose the crazy if they are to be relevant next time around.

To say Yobbo is a political inept as well as a bigot would be an understatement.

At least a third of Americans identify either as ‘born again’ or evangelical Christians and in some surveys upwards of 47%.

Approx 20% of Catholics identify as ‘born again’ or evangelical so even if they are excluded the numbers of voters are still huge.

Moreover 70% of blacks are evangelical Christians

I wonder if Yobbo will ever tire of proving recurrently that he’s a bigoted f-ckwit?

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 6:03 pm
I don’t “support” abortion, but…

LOL.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 6:06 pm
Tonight on Q&A:
Voldemort (Peter Garrett)
Christopher Pyne
No mention of other guests but this weeks show will be heavily centered around giving a Gonski…or not giving a Gonski….. or giving a Gonski so long as someone pays for it……or not giving a Gonski because we can’t afford it.

Expect plenty of questions on Abbott’s sanity, Gay marriage and Abbott’s repulsive views, Red Ted and Abbott’s part in his downfall, 457′s and how Abbott is allowing foreigners to steal aussie jobs.

Splatacrobat

11 Mar 13 at 6:06 pm
As far as how to legislate regarding abortion, the Roe Vs Wade way of recognizing the increasing seriousness of the matter as the pregnancy progresses seems to me to be a quite reasonable approach.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 6:09 pm
James

Yobbo seems to suffer from the same syndrome limey’s do. They think they can talk down to Americans because, guess what, they just aren’t like them.

Well fuck me, isn’t that a shock. Americans are different to Limeys and Australians and have differing beliefs etc.

Count me as someone who’s shocked

It seems to me that Yobbo and others like him have no real conception that in America you can be evangelical, Observant Jew, Hindu, whatever and still think that smaller government is a powerful economic driver. Ron and Rand Paul are two examples.

Texas for instance is a highly religious state and powers along with smaller government. There’s almost no building code in Texas for instance.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:10 pm
When James Fraser* separated from his wife, he still supported his family and was able to see his six children daily. That all changed when he started seeing another woman. They divorced, sold the house and the pair’s respective lawyers worked out a parenting plan that allowed James time with the children every second weekend. His ex-wife hasn’t always kept to the arrangement.

Note that it was okay until another woman came onto the scene. That story is so common.

As for the article, a lot of shaming language in there, and I see a paragraph addressing Thomas Ball, who set himself alight outside the courthouse and died.

Perhaps people would be a bit more enlightened if they read his story rather than just a few words in a ShakeMyHead hatchet piece on men who are eviscerated by the system.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 6:12 pm
As far as how to legislate regarding abortion, the Roe Vs Wade way of recognizing the increasing seriousness of the matter as the pregnancy progresses seems to me to be a quite reasonable approach.

Yea, it’s reasonable. You want a court to decide on such things rather than a legislature like in Australia. You do realize the parliaments set abortion laws in Oz, right?

You really are a fuckwit bogan, Stepford. You’re like a large number of fuckwit Australians who have either not been to the US or visited the west coast and NYC for a coupla weeks and consider themselves to be experts on perhaps the most complex society on earth.

(Like that dickhead neighbor of mine I had a tangle with at the street Xmas party).

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:14 pm
The most wacky utterance from any American politician in the last 50 years was Obama’s “beyond my paygrade” regarding when human life begins.

It begins at conception – as medical text books point out for the unknowing.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 6:16 pm
Hi Steve -

That’s very remembering of you. Lord Goggle-eyes was actually a fascinating speaker. I can’t imagine having sat through three hours of anyone else, but he kept us laughing and kept us interested. That’s no mean feat in itself, given that the hall was hot, the chairs hard, and the people many.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:18 pm
JC, most people reading what I said would have understood that I was referring to general principles to follow when abortion laws are devised. Your ranty attack was well off the point.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 6:22 pm
Any chance the religion argument can be taken over to the religion thread? Please?

The believers were soundly thrashed in the religion thread, and have abandoned it and resorted to just sniping in the open forum.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 6:24 pm
They think they can talk down to Americans

I don’t care where you are from. If you believe that the Earth is less than 10,000 and Adam and Eve rode around on Dinosaurs, then yes you are retarded and yes I will treat you as such.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 6:26 pm
Steve, you’ve missed the point on contraception/abortion.

Contraception today in Australia is safe and easily accessible and reasonably cheap (and in many cases free).

Yet the numbers of abortions in Australia continue to rise. It’s something like over 100,000 a year now nationally.

So having effective, accessible contraception doesn’t actually stop abortions at all. The figures are there to prove it.

Abortion will never be rare as long as we regard unborn children as disposable, ‘clumps of cells’, etc.

Perhaps if we thought differently, it would become rare. ‘Gosh, a baby – can’t raise it myself; so maybe I’ll give someone else a shot at it instead. Only nine months out of my life, and I’m looking at a lifespan of over 80 now, so perhaps I can give up those few months to give someone else a chance at having a great life.’

This kind of thinking for unplanned pregnancies would help to ease the adoption logjam as well.

The only flaw in my otherwise well thought out plan is that most of the women I see going into abortion clinics are married/partnered. It’s harder to think about giving a baby away under those circumstances, but hey – is that a bad thing?

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:26 pm
less than 10,000 years old*

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 6:26 pm
Some reckon US public sector unfunded pension liabilities are around $2.2 trillion.

You mean $120 trillion I think JC.

Federal government debt is presently $16.5 trillion.

Medicare and social security unfunded liabilities over the next 25 years alone is over $70 trillion.

Medicare will be bankrupt this decade and social security early the next.

Public sector pension unfunded liabilities at all levels of government over the next 30 years are said to be $100 trillion.

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 6:28 pm
The believers were soundly thrashed in the religion thread,

Were they just. Tsk, what a shame and hazaar! for you.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 6:28 pm
Lord Goggle-eyes

I approve of that part of the comment.

was actually a fascinating speaker

Clearly, you aren’t in the market for an Asian boyfriend, then.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 6:28 pm
The believers were soundly thrashed in the religion thread, and have abandoned it and resorted to just sniping in the open forum.

Yobbo’s not just in denial, he’s entered the rubric of schizophrenic delusion

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 6:29 pm
Clearly, you aren’t in the market for an Asian boyfriend, then.

SFB channels bogan Mathieson.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 6:30 pm
A bit of a nerd alert on my part, but I’m not sure how many of you have seen today’s Google Doodle. It’s in celebration of what would have been Douglas Adams’ 61st birthday.

http://gadgets.ndtv.com/others/news/douglas-adams-61st-birthday-marked-by-google-doodle-340751

After thinking about it, it occurred to me that the original conception of the electronic Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy is actually a real thing that we can hold in our hands and use now, 30 years hence. The future he envisioned through satire and comedy is actually a reality. We can carry around tablet computers that have enough storage capacity to hold near enough all the text ever produced by humanity or at least get access to it over the Internet.

I don’t know about you lot, but I think that it is an absolutely amazing thing. But then again I am a nerd.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 6:30 pm
The awful thing about abortion is that it’s the panic button. Women are rushed and pressured into the abortion decision by partners, friends, parents, employers, abortion providers, and their own fears.

They then have the rest of their lives to think about it, and that’s why this association - of which I am proudly a patron – is so busy. I wish it weren’t so busy, but I’m glad it is, because it means these women are getting a second chance now. This second chance gives them the time and space they need, and which they weren’t given when they were pregnant.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:32 pm
I’m still waiting for the cars from The Jetsons to be made manifest, tbh.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 6:32 pm
Only nine months out of my life, and I’m looking at a lifespan of over 80 now, so perhaps I can give up those few months to give someone else a chance at having a great life.’

This kind of thinking for unplanned pregnancies would help to ease the adoption logjam as well.

I’m not sure when it happened or why, but a fair while ago now, most Australian women decided that having to give away a baby was much more emotionally damaging than having one aborted.

I’m sure there were some movies or TV shows that perpetuated this.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 6:33 pm
Clearly, you aren’t in the market for an Asian boyfriend, then.

I’m so sorry, Steve, I’m afraid you’ve lost me. Is this a witticism about eye shape? Or general proportions of the female-doctor Mathieson variety? I’m sorry to be so obtuse, but it’s been a busy day.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:35 pm
Yobbo,

First off I don’t believe the earth is 10,000 years old. Secondly, if I did you couldn’t treat me that way because I don’t ever have to meet you and if we did and you were rude or abusive to me, I’d possibly deck you. So your argument doesn’t work if you want to personalize it.

But more importantly, why do you give a shit what people believe as long as they obey the laws etc. It’s really none of your fucking business what people believe.

Focus on the real stuff that causes far more damage. Leftwingers believing that hiking wages raises employment.

You’re really going after the wrong people.

And as for your theory about the US…

The Red states which are obviously more god bothering (to you your parlance) and doing far better economically than the decaying blue states. So if causation is correlation in this instance, you’re fucked.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:36 pm
I think you’re right, Yobbo, and it IS traumatic, but so is having an abortion. Having an actual baby is traumatic too when a woman has no support. With support, adoption and keeping a baby become much less difficult. They’re still difficult decisions, but so so much less difficult than they could be.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:36 pm
I don’t normally participate in abortion debates, but this comment piqued my interest.

The awful thing about abortion is that it’s the panic button. Women are rushed and pressured into the abortion decision by partners, friends, parents, employers, abortion providers, and their own fears.

Philippa, given that you are plugged into this situation more than most, why is it that fewer babies are adopted out in Australia now? Surely that’s still an option?

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 6:38 pm
I don’t know about you lot, but I think that it is an absolutely amazing thing. But then again I am a nerd.

Yea but 97.47% of it is crap… pure sludge, as this small example shows.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:39 pm
Which brings me back to the question – WHY so many unplanned pregnancies in Australia each year?

Contraception is peddled practically from birth; there cannot be a human being left in this country who doesn’t know what it is or how to use it. So what’s going wrong?

Or are we being lied to by manufacturers about the ‘success’ rates of various forms of contraception?

Or is what I have long suspected true, and everyone under the age of 30 has forgotten that sex is the human race’s way of reproducing? And that if you do the thing that’s designed to make babies, chances are you might make a baby?

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:40 pm
Having an actual baby is traumatic too when a woman has no support.

Here’s a novel idea, Philippa. Don’t get fucking pregnant then. I’m told it works.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:41 pm
tbh, the babies ain’t there. They’ve been flushed/scraped at the rate of 100,000 a year. That’s a lot of babies.

In the odd cases that they’re allowed to survive the first nine months, they’re snapped up like hot cakes, often through intra-family adoption.

So infertile Australian couples are queueing up for IVF and overseas babies. It takes years and it’s often unsuccessful, but obviously they think it’s worth it.

Surrogacy is now taking the place of unplanned pregnancy adoption as well.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:42 pm
But more importantly, why do you give a shit what people believe as long as they obey the laws etc. It’s really none of your fucking business what people believe.

Focus on the real stuff that causes far more damage. Leftwingers believing that hiking wages raises employment.

You’re really going after the wrong people.

It is a pity that very smart people waste resources on issues which distract from what is important.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 6:43 pm
Yea but 97.47% of it is crap… pure sludge, as this small example shows.

Sturgeon’s Law states that it’s 90%, but anyway. That 10% of good stuff makes the whole thing worth it IMHO.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 6:43 pm
JC, this is kind of where I am heading – and it puzzles me that the rates of unplanned pregnancies seem to be so very, very high.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 6:43 pm
Or is what I have long suspected true, and everyone under the age of 30 has forgotten that sex is the human race’s way of reproducing?

Hey, wait a minute, isn’t it one of the huge laundry list of rights?

Token

11 Mar 13 at 6:44 pm
tbh, the babies ain’t there. They’ve been flushed/scraped at the rate of 100,000 a year. That’s a lot of babies.

Yeah I get that, but I guess what I’m driving at is why is it that women with unwanted pregnancies don’t seem to want to adopt them out and would rather abort? Convenience I guess.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 6:45 pm
Which brings me back to the question – WHY so many unplanned pregnancies in Australia each year?

I have a pet theory on that one.

Women want to get pregnant to a particular man and will do anything to be able to do so…. even get pregnant without potential support, as they want that dudes kid. Worse comes to worse and the state is there with open arms.

Disturbingly, you hear of women stealing sperm these days too.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:45 pm
Sturgeon’s Law states that it’s 90%, but anyway. That 10% of good stuff makes the whole thing worth it IMHO.

Lol…

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:46 pm
Philippa, there are also a lot of women now who see abortion as merely another form of contraceptive tool. They find out too late, and since it is such a common occurrence today, they often don’t feel as if they can grieve.

I’m glad that your association is around. I’d heard of Rachel’s Vineyard but hadn’t heard of anything close to an Australian group that might help women and men who suffer after an abortion.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 6:48 pm
Who said this,

When you’re hot, you’re hot. And when you’re not, you’re Julia Gillard.

The answer may surprise you. As the rusted-ons fall away, the commentistas are not impressed.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 6:49 pm
Bear..

FFS please stick a warning label on stuff like that. I’m about to have dinner and that rodent’s pic should not be in mind at this time.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 6:51 pm
I’m so sorry, Steve, I’m afraid you’ve lost me.

Just a little up thread, I had posted about the theory that Asian Americans have run away from the Republicans because on creationism and climate change they are seen as anti science.

Sorry, I know, it only made sense if you had read that, but I assume everyone reads everything I say with enthusiasm. (heh). Oh – and you had said something about people locking up their sons, as you were going out, so I thought it safe to assume you were single.

As for your abortion comments – the matter is complicated, with lots of contradictory material from all over the world regarding the interaction between contraception, abortion rates, and culture.

Can’t really respond just now…

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 6:54 pm
First off I don’t believe the earth is 10,000 years old.

That’s great. Score one for the good guys. However, a majority of republican voters do believe that.

Secondly, if I did you couldn’t treat me that way because I don’t ever have to meet you and if we did and you were rude or abusive to me, I’d possibly deck you.

You’d be welcome to try.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 6:55 pm
Here’s a novel idea, Philippa. Don’t get fucking pregnant then. I’m told it works.

I was thinking about this sort of thing this arvo. I’ve been involved in a few discussion on celibacy, and abstinence lately, and I have no problem whatsoever with them, and think they should be properly incorporated into sex ed (sorry, sexuality education as it’s called these days).

I’ve been told that there’s no use in teaching the kids about abstinence as they’re going to do it anyway.

If that’s the thinking of the day, then why should we tell fat people not to eat junk food? They’re going to eat it anyway.

Why tell people not to get drunk? They’re going to do it.

Why teach people about responsible drug use when they’re going to go their own way anyway?

It seems we’re allowed to talk to people about any sort of behaviour so long as it’s got nothing to do with sex. We might hurt people’s feelings, I guess, if we suggest they try restraint for a change.

Can’t have that now. Better to just scrape out the byproducts of irresponsible, unprotected fun.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 6:56 pm
FFS please stick a warning label on stuff like that. I’m about to have dinner and that rodent’s pic should not be in mind at this time.

Which one, Mungo or Gillard?

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 6:59 pm
Which one, Mungo or Gillard?

@tbh. Yes.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 7:01 pm
JC – how exactly do women steal sperm? (Just interested to know where you heard that?) Do they do when the man has his eyes closed and isnt watching?

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 7:01 pm
I’ve been told that there’s no use in teaching the kids about abstinence as they’re going to do it anyway.

I doubt you can point to anyone who is opposed to teaching abstinence. The problem is with fundie groups who insist that abstinence is the only thing that can be taught to kids. Teaching them about safe sex and condoms is apparently not ok.

This is what people mean when they say they are opposed to “abstinence-only education”.

The equivalent in your food analogy is to omit teaching people that excess food can be burned off with vigorous exercise.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:01 pm
Sexual autonomy is the cornerstone of the post 1960s Western world. It’s the fundamental principle which is not open to negotiation.

This isn’t written down anywhere, but if you try suggesting otherwise, you will quickly discover that it IS in fact the single most fundamental human and social right that exists today.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 7:02 pm
Philippa, given that you are plugged into this situation more than most, why is it that fewer babies are adopted out in Australia now?

Because women abort babies now because they are inconvenient to their current plans. You know, they’ve just purchased a new bikini or have a friends wedding coming up. Waiting 9 months is a drag when you could just kill the thing now.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 7:03 pm
The problem is that it’s not pregnancy that many of these fundies are worried about. It’s the possibility that their kids are having sex at all. Even safe sex.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:03 pm
Just face it, the US religious right is crazy, and that’s why we’re into the 2nd term of Obama. Republicans need to lose the crazy if they are to be relevant next time around.

So how have the scientific beliefs of Democrats led them to substantively better political judgments during their first and second term? If someone believes that human beings walked with dinosaurs, politically, I don’t really care so long as they support limited government, and so on. I’m speaking about voters here, not about candidates.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 7:08 pm
Well if my girl saving herself for marriage means that she doesn’t end up a single parent like me then I’m not going to discourage her, Yobbo.

What is wrong with not shagging everything that moves?

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 7:09 pm
JC – how exactly do women steal sperm? (Just interested to know where you heard that?) Do they do when the man has his eyes closed and isnt watching?

Yea pretty much… without going into the finer details I’ve read it’s stolen from condom.. stolen or used.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:10 pm
As for your abortion comments – the matter is complicated, with lots of contradictory material from all over the world regarding the interaction between contraception, abortion rates, and culture.

Fair enough, but I’m talking about Australia.

It’s in Australia that there’s around 100,000 abortions a year – A YEAR – and at the same time more contraception than you can shake an IUD at, all spilling out the doors of one’s local FPA clinic, GP, school nurse’s office, health fair, university health centre, etc etc etc.

And yet … 100,000 a year. Or thereabouts. The rate may be slowing a little, but it’s actually quite hard to get decent figures on it, because only the Medicare ones are reported.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 7:10 pm
You’d be welcome to try.

Okay. Thanks for the offer.

So you go around in social settings asking people how old they think the earth is?

Really? That’s fucking weird.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:12 pm
These sperm crimes must be very well planned. There’s only a small window of fertility each month for the average healthy woman of reproductive years.

Menfolk, I would be checking the lady’s handbag for concealed turkey basters if you’re not sure of her intentions vis a vis your wild oats.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 7:14 pm
The problem is that it’s not pregnancy that many of these fundies are worried about. It’s the possibility that their kids are having sex at all. Even safe sex.

Yeah.

Yeah, that’s it.

You twit.

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 7:15 pm
What is wrong with not shagging everything that moves?

There’s nothing wrong with it in theory, it’s just an unrealistic expectation.

Teens have been shagging each other for 200,000 years.

It’s only in about the last 60 years that we decided this was a bad thing.

All attempts to make them stop have utterly failed. “Teenage pregnancy” was the norm around the world 100 years ago, and still is in many places.

It is completely unrealistic to expect teenagers to abstain from sex. The instinct to do it is incredibly strong.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:17 pm
So you go around in social settings asking people how old they think the earth is?

No, but if I found out that someone believed that, I’d do my best to avoid them. If you believe the Earth is 10,000 years old, you will believe anything and can not be trusted to act rationally.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:19 pm
These sperm crimes must be very well planned.

Perhaps, or perhaps not.

There’s only a small window of fertility each month for the average healthy woman of reproductive years.

Okay.

Menfolk, I would be checking the lady’s handbag for concealed turkey basters if you’re not sure of her intentions vis a vis your wild oats.

This poor fucker certainly should have.

Wed, Nov 23 2011
←

Woman Steals Ex-Boyfriend’s Sperm, Has Twins, Sues For Child Support

Read more: http://www.mommyish.com/2011/11/23/woman-steals-ex-boyfriends-sperm-has-twins-sues-for-child-support-836/#ixzz2NDWP2joV

Or this poor schlep.

Joseph Pressil is suing his girlfriend Anetria Burnett because she allegedly took the sperm from their used condoms to a fertility clinic to get in vitro fertilization. Pressil also alleges that she was trying to get pregnant so she could have possession of his Texas home (Pressil now lives in Long Island), and child support payments.

http://starcasm.net/archives/130812

This bitch fesses up.

The craving for a baby that drives women to the ultimate deception
Liz Jones makes her most shocking confession yet

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2056875/Liz-Jones-baby-craving-drove-steal-husbands-sperm-ultimate-deception.html#ixzz2NDXD7vJH
Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:19 pm
No, but if I found out that someone believed that, I’d do my best to avoid them.

But you weren’t suggesting earlier that you would avoid such people. You were suggesting the opposite actually… that you would look out for them and then abuse them.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:23 pm
Yes, teen pregnancy was indeed normal, but so was teen marriage and the girls staying home to raise the kids.

But now the teens aren’t allowed/encouraged to get married and make any sort of commitment for the baby – just get an abortion and it’ll be okay.

The relationships they form are just as disposable as babies they conceive, and that is mirrored across the greater population.

But hey, they know about contraception so it’s all okay.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 7:23 pm
I had posted about the theory that Asian Americans have run away from the Republicans because on creationism and climate change they are seen as anti science.

So what, we discussed this last November when people like Charles Murray, Rob Long and Jonah Goldberg discussed it in November.

I posted those articles as reform is required and did so in the face of the odious Pat when he was trying to smack m0nty around.

Labor shill Steve only post it as the leftard trolls you read finally have caught up.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 7:24 pm
the Roe Vs Wade way of recognizing the increasing seriousness of the matter as the pregnancy progresses seems to me to be a quite reasonable approach.

Except that Roe didn’t do this. What it did was create a plenary right that is unqualified but which at different stages could be qualified by the government where there was a state interest (this has nothing to do with the rights of the fetus; it has none since Roe). There is a good discussion of the issues here.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 7:24 pm
There’s this weird idea that pregnancy and babies are worse than death. They end your career, etc. But the fact is if you want kids – and most people still do – you are going to need to get that done before the end of your 30′s. Even a mid 30′s start is pushing it. It’s unfashionable to suggest having kids “early” ie., starting in your 20′s, but it works, you’re at peak fertility, and you have plenty of time to rebuild your career after.

I am optimistic that our culture can get over this pre-occupation with balancing your career and life by abandoning everything in life beside career.

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 7:26 pm
No, but if I found out that someone believed that, I’d do my best to avoid them. If you believe the Earth is 10,000 years old, you will believe anything and can not be trusted to act rationally.

Why don’t you have the same absolute opinion of economic flat earthers?

(e.g. If you think putting limits on markets will grow the economy and minimum wages will create employment)

Why waste your time on people whose beliefs only inhibit themselves, not every other person in society.

Seems like tilting at windmills to me.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 7:26 pm
SfB QC and crazy Alice together. Great

Tiny Dancer

11 Mar 13 at 7:29 pm
Philippa: Bettina Arndt wrote recently about why Australia has the abortion rate it does when contraception is readily available. She blames doctors and the public being poorly advised on the best contraceptive choices, and she may have a point. A recent study in the US (of which you are probably aware) showed that if you made free, longer lasting types of contraception available to women who figured they needed it, it did indeed lead to a big drop in unwanted pregnancies and abortions.

Of course, from a cultural point of view, the Netherlands shows that a very open sex education, and wide availability of contraception, along with a cultural attitude whereby unintended pregnancy is just seen as dumb, has meant that country has had a very comparatively low abortion rate despite liberal abortion laws.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 7:31 pm
SfB QC and crazy Alice together. Great

Sinc, please set up one of those threads to distract the mentally impaired like you did on Sat night to keep mAlice & Numbers distracted. It made all the other threads so much more pleasant.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 7:31 pm
Not just stealing sperm from used condoms. Philippa.

This woman was quite daring. I could really make a decent joke about this one, but I think I’ll leave it well enough alone.

A judge made a wise decision indeed in a rather complicated case connected with illegal use of sperm. A man sued his ex-girlfriend, when he found out that she had secretly used his sperm to conceive a child. The judge ruled that the woman’s actions could not be viewed as criminal, because the man had given his sperm to her on a voluntary basis.

Dr. Richard Phillips sued Dr. Sharon Irons several years ago. Phillips said that his former girlfriend, Irons, deceived him by stealing his own semen that she obtained through oral sex. The woman subsequently used Phillips’s sperm to get pregnant without his knowledge. The two lovers had parted by that moment, and Richard Phillips knew nothing about the baby. The ex-girlfriend also surprised her former boyfriend. Sharon Irons filed a paternity suit seeking monthly allowance for the baby.

and

The Illinois Appeals Court has finally acknowledged the rightfulness of the deceived man. The court ruled that Sharon Irons had a sexual affair with Richard Phillips to obtain his semen. Oral sex eventually resulted in pregnancy, which is obviously impossible, and testifies to premeditated fraudulent intentions of the woman, the court said. The judge added, however, that it was not correct to accuse Irons of sperm theft. Ejaculation was a gift of the plaintiff. Furthermore, there was no agreement that the original deposit would be returned upon request, the decision said.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:35 pm
http://www.news.com.au/sport/cricket/australian-cricketers-shane-watson-usman-khawaja-james-pattinson-and-mitchell-johnson-axed-from-third-test/story-fndpt0dy-1226595001591

Cricket Australia has totally lost the plot this time. It’s time for Mickey Arthur and John Inverarity to go.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:35 pm
Joseph Pressil is suing his girlfriend Anetria Burnett because she allegedly took the sperm from their used condoms to a fertility clinic to get in vitro fertilization. Pressil also alleges that she was trying to get pregnant so she could have possession of his Texas home (Pressil now lives in Long Island), and child support payments.

I can see a number of things wrong here, namely that the clinic seems to have leaped in very happily and done the deed with no recourse to the sperm’s original source.

I’d also be thinking that with twins, she had been taking fertility drugs for some time and planning this in the context of their relationship, which was ongoing but obviously very troubled. This is a long way off a one-night stand.

She’d also have to have saved up her dough, because IVF isn’t cheap.

But I would also argue that this is a problem created by the IVF culture of child-entitlement, whereby a woman is morally, legally and completely and utterly entitled to a baby via IVF, no matter what, no ifs or ands or buts. No wonder the clinic simply took her word for it …

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 7:37 pm
If you believe the Earth is 10,000 years old, you will believe anything and can not be trusted to act rationally.

Why? People have only known the age of the earth for a little over a hundred years and yet acted rationally before learning it. Krugman knows the age of the earth and yet believes you can spend yourself out of debt.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 7:37 pm
She blames doctors and the public being poorly advised on the best contraceptive choices, and she may have a point. A recent study in the US (of which you are probably aware) showed that if you made free, longer lasting types of contraception available to women who figured they needed it, it did indeed lead to a big drop in unwanted pregnancies and abortions.

Yea… Pew reserch says that only 25% of females have ever heard on Condoms, 7% have only heard of the pill and 2% heard of withdrawal.

You fucking goose stepford.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:38 pm
This is a long way off a one-night stand.

I never even remotely suggested it happens in a one nighter.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:39 pm
Why don’t you have the same absolute opinion of economic flat earthers?

Two reasons, Token.

1. That’s most likely what they were taught at school. I was certainly taught Keynesian economics at high school.

2. Economics is a lot more complex and difficult to understand than the age of the Earth as explained by science.

I try and educate people otherwise when it comes to economics. I believe they are just misinformed.

But it takes deliberate ignorance of the facts to believe that Earth is 10,000 years old and that humans lived side by side with dinosaurs. Furthermore, there is absolutely no basis for that belief except what is written in the bible. So you already know that you are dealing with someone who has abandoned all reason and rationality.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:40 pm
Steve, I think that’s right, which also indicates that the Pill myth is just that – a myth.

Yet it’s peddled as the most effective form of contraception, to everyone’s considerable profit – except the women who get pregnant on it.

Of course, the other more effective forms of contraception can give you infections and in some cases heart attacks and strokes, but hey, who’s counting …

And as to sperm theft: well, boys, it just goes to show that you need to be a bit more careful about what you’re doing with your winkle in your leisure time. Remember, that stuff can actually make babies. Amazing. Ask your doctor if you don’t believe me.

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 7:41 pm
Stop rationalizing bullshit Yobbo.

People thinking Keynesian economics to be correct are far more dangerous to the world’s health than a few fuckers thinking the earth is 10,000 years old.

You can never admit you’re wrong, can you.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:42 pm
JC: you really don’t bother to understand the argument put before you attack it, do you?

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 7:43 pm
It is completely unrealistic to expect teenagers to abstain from sex. The instinct to do it is incredibly strong.

So says the loather of the institution of Marriage.

Will wonders never cease?

Happiness is associated with long term marriage and successful marriage is inversely associated with at least extensive premarital sexual experience and pre-marital cohabitation.

Lotsa black American teenagers root and most kids are brought up in single-parent families but the black American familial dysfunction is the cause of the overwhelming majority of firearm and violent deaths in the US.

What’s unrealistic is the logic of Yobbo, the Cat’s resident nasty bigot.

His ‘rational mind’(lol) tells him that instant gratification is inevitable so why bother educate that delaying instant gratification is the sine qua non of success?

Well, maybe we all want our young people to enjoy a successful and happy life?

Well… except our resident bigoted moron, evidently.

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 7:43 pm
I think this whole discussion also lends itself to a sort of backhanded defence of lifelong monogamous marriage and parenthood.

If you don’t want someone to conceive a child with your genetic material, don’t let them anywhere near your sperm/eggs!

But if you don’t mind the idea, then why not do it properly and settle down together and raise the sprog with two parents, and give him or her a chance at an interesting and useful life?

Philippa Martyr

11 Mar 13 at 7:44 pm
And as to sperm theft: well, boys, it just goes to show that you need to be a bit more careful about what you’re doing with your winkle in your leisure time. Remember, that stuff can actually make babies. Amazing. Ask your doctor if you don’t believe me.

another woman absolving other females of appalling behavior. Yep, it’s the boys fault.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:44 pm
But now the teens aren’t allowed/encouraged to get married and make any sort of commitment for the baby – just get an abortion and it’ll be okay.

Yeah, sex is no longer a scandal, but getting pregnant is every bit the scandal it was 50 years ago. Well hello; when girls have sex they get pregnant. If we were really less wowserish this would be less of an issue, but our society is still amazingly prudish. See breast feeding, the scandal of pregnancy, etc.

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 7:45 pm
Semenblogger is in his element here.

blogstrop

11 Mar 13 at 7:46 pm
BTW, I would like it noted on the record that it was not me who introduced the term “sperm crimes” to Catallaxy.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 7:46 pm
JC: you really don’t bother to understand the argument put before you attack it, do you?

I did, stepford. You argued that da sex education will help reduce teen pregnancy using Holland as an example.

I suggested that you’re a dumb fuck for the following reasons.

1. You actually think in this day and age a large number of people don’t know how to avoid pregnancy during sex?

2. You totally miss the point that Holland may be an outlier for cultural reasons.

As I said before stepford… you’re a fucking idiot.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:48 pm
But if you don’t mind the idea, then why not do it properly and settle down together and raise the sprog with two parents, and give him or her a chance at an interesting and useful life?

Everybody knows that that is a worst-case scenario for the child, mother and society. The only person who benefits is the father, due to mumble mumble mumble. He gets all sorts of benefits, like…. well, like….

Well like getting a job, taking responsibility, manning up and raising his kids – every teenage boys’ ultimate fantasy! Thank goodness we’ve stepped in to stop such exploitation!

Okay, I’m done with sarcasm now.

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 7:49 pm
BTW, I would like it noted on the record that it was not me who introduced the term “sperm crimes” to Catallaxy.

Duly noted.

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 7:49 pm
BTW, I would like it noted on the record that it was not me who introduced the term “sperm crimes” to Catallaxy.

Admit it, stepford. You would have loved to.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:51 pm
JC, you’re still busily confirming you can’t be bothered understanding before you open your big mouth.

Reading links to articles being cited also helps.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 7:51 pm
I try and educate people otherwise when it comes to economics. I believe they are just misinformed.

But it takes deliberate ignorance of the facts to believe that Earth is 10,000 years old and that humans lived side by side with dinosaurs.

Around 100 million people died in the 20th century due to that ignorance.

Nobody has died due to people believing in creationism, no matter how ill informed a view is.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 7:52 pm
Furthermore, there is absolutely no basis for that belief except what is written in the bible.

Except that date appears no where in the Bible.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 7:53 pm
JC, you’re still busily confirming you can’t be bothered understanding before you open your big mouth.

This swill.

A recent study in the US (of which you are probably aware) showed that if you made free, longer lasting types of contraception available to women who figured they needed it, it did indeed lead to a big drop in unwanted pregnancies and abortions.

Of course, from a cultural point of view, the Netherlands shows that a very open sex education, and wide availability of contraception, along with a cultural attitude whereby unintended pregnancy is just seen as dumb, has meant that country has had a very comparatively low abortion rate despite liberal abortion laws.

I did, hence my reply, you moron.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 7:54 pm
“that” is ignorance of economics created by a class of people who use faith to deny economic reality and use it to implement policies where freedom is lost by large numbers of people and dissenters are killed.

Creationists just believe non-believers can go to hell and will be prevented from implementing bad policy by the majority who believe in Intelligent Design and Pure Evolution.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 7:54 pm
Nobody has died from believing in Fairies either, but if an adult person genuinely believed in fairies, you would probably not take their opinions on anything seriously.

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:54 pm
Nobody has died from believing in Fairies either, but if an adult person genuinely believed in fairies, you would probably not take their opinions on anything seriously.

I wouldn’t waste valuable time and resources opposing their harmless view. That would be tilting at windmills.

Token

11 Mar 13 at 7:57 pm
So the vile sexual predator arrives again to stalk the females. This time it’s a female who is restrained and personable and doesn’t sense the danger of going to a political blog — exactly why it’s so attractive for the suburban would-be rapist who lives a pathetic fantasy porn life inside his own head at a blog without an audience — except when he escapes to the outside world of the Cat. A warning again to the women: don’t reveal anything that’s even vaguely personal when this creep is around.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 7:58 pm
Except that date appears no where in the Bible.

And yet, that date has been extrapolated by Christian theologians from what was written in the bible. There is a whole timeline of when creation, exodus, Noah’s flood etc occurred.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chronology_of_the_Bible#Creation_to_the_Flood

Yobbo

11 Mar 13 at 7:59 pm
If you believe the Earth is 10,000 years old

Yeah. Anyone that believes the earth is that old is nuts.

Not to say anything for the dopey buggers who fall for the 4.5 billion figure, assuming all sorts of unscientific quackery like the speed of light being a constant and the half life of uranium to be constant over the course of history.

: p

Driftforge

11 Mar 13 at 8:00 pm
Just when you think the Australian cricket team couldn’t lower their status as an under-performing, laughing stock, four players are dropped for not doing their homework.
Admittedly, one of them is Watto and wouldn’t make any difference. Can anyone imaging someone telling Ian Chappell or Rodney Marsh they were being dropped for such a half arsed reason?

It is going to be a bleak winter for anyone with Pommy mates and follow the Ashes. I suggest changing your email now.

H B Bear

11 Mar 13 at 8:02 pm
T too would be very suspicious of anyone claiming the world is 10,000 years old I think it’s only 5773 since the creation.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 8:02 pm
Oh dear: Tom, it’s vaguely interesting that you fantasise about being able to identify potential rapists from the fact they note sometimes matters of interest re sex and reproduction on a blog or two, but here’s a tip: you are not Sherlock Holmes. In fact, you’re outing yourself as kinda nuts.

steve from brisbane

11 Mar 13 at 8:03 pm
16 man squad
4 banned
Wade injured but Haddin coming to be standby

How would you feel if you were one of the available 12 but not one of the 11.

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 8:05 pm
but if an adult person genuinely believed in fairies, you would probably not take their opinions on anything seriously.

And yet you probably take the scientific theories of Maxwell seriously even though he was a devout Christian. And so on.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 8:08 pm
Except that date appears no where in the Bible.

And yet, that date has been extrapolated by Christian theologians

Wikipedia – since Yobbo the ever bigoted moron puts great store by it rationalise his fanatical hatreds:

In 1862, the physicist William Thomson (who later became Lord Kelvin) of Glasgow published calculations that fixed the age of Earth at between 20 million and 400 million years.[15][16] He assumed that Earth had formed as a completely molten object, and determined the amount of time it would take for the near-surface to cool to its present temperature. His calculations did not account for heat produced via radioactive decay (a process then unknown to science) or convection inside the Earth, which allows more heat to escape from the interior to warm rocks near the surface.[15]

Geologists had trouble accepting such a short age for Earth. Biologists could accept that Earth might have a finite age, but even 100 million years seemed much too short to be plausible. Charles Darwin, who had studied Lyell’s work, had proposed his theory of the evolution of organisms by natural selection, a process whose combination of random heritable variation and cumulative selection implies great expanses of time. (Geneticists have subsequently measured the rate of genetic divergence of species, using the molecular clock, to date the last universal ancestor of all living organisms no later than 3.5 to 3.8 billion years ago).

In a lecture in 1869, Darwin’s great advocate, Thomas H. Huxley, attacked Thomson’s calculations, suggesting they appeared precise in themselves but were based on faulty assumptions. The German physicist Hermann von Helmholtz (in 1856) and the Canadian astronomer Simon Newcomb (in 1892) contributed their own calculations of 22 and 18 million years respectively to the debate: they independently calculated the amount of time it would take for the Sun to condense down to its current diameter and brightness from the nebula of gas and dust from which it was born.[17] Their values were consistent with Thomson’s calculations. However, they assumed that the Sun was only glowing from the heat of its gravitational contraction. The process of solar nuclear fusion was not yet known to science.

Other scientists backed up Thomson’s figures as well. Charles Darwin’s son, the astronomer George H. Darwin of the University of Cambridge, proposed that Earth and Moon had broken apart in their early days when they were both molten. He calculated the amount of time it would have taken for tidal friction to give Earth its current 24-hour day. His value of 56 million years added additional evidence that Thomson was on the right track.[17]

The last estimate Thomson gave, in 1897, was: “that it was more than 20 and less than 40 million year old, and probably much nearer 20 than 40″.[18] In 1899 and 1900, John Joly of the Trinity College, Dublin calculated the rate at which the oceans should have accumulated salt from erosion processes, and determined that the oceans were about 80 to 100 million years old.[17]

The modern estimate for the the age of the Earth is 4.54 ± 0.05 billion years (4.54 × 109 years ± 1%)

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 8:09 pm
Whalehunt 8:35 am

Ahhh, impersonating mAliice!

kae

11 Mar 13 at 8:17 pm
Yobbo-style ‘rational’ thinking:

The Bible tells us the that in the beginning was the Word.
We all know The Big Bang is three words ergo the bible is wrong and the loathsome Christians and their loathsome god don't exist.
Q.E.D.

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 8:23 pm
Did I also mention that, apart from being a sexual pervert, Dogshit is a troll whose only purpose in being here is to pick fights? This human scum doesn’t see anything wrong with being the blogosphere’s lowest form of life whose whole existence is devoted to being a spoiler for opponents of the party who provides him with $25,0000-$50,000 p.a. in government sitdown money for bludgers who refuse to work.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 8:27 pm
… if an adult person genuinely believed in fairies, you would probably not take their opinions on anything seriously.

You mean like the Catholic priest who posited the Big Bang theory?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Georges_Lema%C3%AEtre

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 8:28 pm
Not to say anything for the dopey buggers who fall for the 4.5 billion figure, assuming all sorts of unscientific quackery like the speed of light being a constant and the half life of uranium to be constant over the course of history.

Why, what’s so wrong with 4.5 billion years. I’ve not been that hugely interested, however I thought that was pretty much the accepted scientific timeline. Is it not?

JC

11 Mar 13 at 8:29 pm
….except when he escapes to the outside world of the Cat. A warning again to the women: don’t reveal anything that’s even vaguely personal when this creep is around.

He once mentioned right on this blog that he was trying to find out where I live through the electoral rolls.

How creepy is that?

JC

11 Mar 13 at 8:30 pm
And yet, that date has been extrapolated by Christian theologians from what was written in the bible. There is a whole timeline of when creation, exodus, Noah’s flood etc occurred.

Yes, there is, but how one extrapolates such a date or figure is underdetermined, which is why the Catechism has never attempted to provide either simply by interpreting the chronology of the Bible.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 8:32 pm
On the radio, Bolt has just confirmed that McTernan offered the story to Fairfax on Saturday morning about the First Fuck Buddy’s charity motorbike ride precisely as counter-propaganda for The Australian‘s Saturday story about his poor behaviour in demanding tickets to sporting events and attempting to exact government retribution against Tony Abbott.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 8:34 pm
I never knew that Newton and Kepler not only were young-earth creationists, but that they themselves attempted to provide a date and figure in the same manner as Ussher did.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 8:34 pm
I keep being told the big bang theory is out of favour again. Can anyone point me at the new theory of “consensus”?

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 8:36 pm
I’m less worried about the Word and the Big Bang than I am about what to drink tonight.

Vodka and orange, frangelico or scotch and coke?

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 8:36 pm
We’re counting on you, Nilk, and the tipsier you are the better it will read.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 8:42 pm
So all of the above then, Tom?

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 8:42 pm
Do what needs to be done, Nilk. Monday night at the Cat is a personal highlight thanks to you and others.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 8:48 pm
But more importantly, why do you give a shit what people believe as long as they obey the laws etc. It’s really none of your fucking business what people believe.

Focus on the real stuff that causes far more damage. Leftwingers believing that hiking wages raises employment.

Lol the evangelical, fevered nu-atheist told to stop ranting about his religion and to just focus on jobs and the economy(tm).

Funny stuff.

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 8:52 pm
How did the religion thread spill over here?

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 8:54 pm
The USS Catallaxy is yet again stuck in a repetition vortex in the Delta Quadrant.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 8:55 pm
Ussher

The best and brightest of protestantism.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 8:56 pm
Who is on Qanda duty? I will put my hand up.

It is The Education Debate tonight. In the Red Corner we have Peter ‘well insulated’ Garrett with Snow Cone and in the blue corner we have Christopher ‘Poodle’ Pyne!

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 9:03 pm
I’m in. Got my scotch and coke and a packet of chicken chips.

I’m set.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:10 pm
btw, I should inform Cats that I have finely decided to drink before Qanda. I am not sure if it will make me more or less angry!

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 9:13 pm
Where’s Sven?

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 9:14 pm
Cricket Australia has totally lost the plot this time. It’s time for Mickey Arthur and John Inverarity to go.

Outrageous.

Having a foreigner in charge of the national team is disgrace to begin with. I don’t care how fucking good they are. You wouldn’t draft Rommel even if he was a cunning evil.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 9:17 pm
God bless you brave people

Tal

11 Mar 13 at 9:18 pm
Please nilk let that be scotch, and coke.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 9:19 pm
With this ‘special’ ‘Education debate’, I am expecting it to be a massive set up full of weeping lefties crying for Gonski. Pyne will be ambushed.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 9:22 pm
Mediawatch on TLS’s slumming in western Sinny.

Holmes talking of the media hivemind. LOL.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:23 pm
Where’s Sven?

You Can’t Hurry Love, Gab.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 9:23 pm
It is indeed scotch (won’t tell you what brand) and Coca Cola.

I won’t comment on ‘special’ education debate. Not yet, anyway.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:25 pm
Short 4 Corners:

1.Obeid is bad (*yawn*).

2. Michael Costa and Morris Iemma were really either bad or stupid.

3. Foreign Minister Bob Carr is both wise and heroic.

Thus endeth the lesson

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 9:25 pm
I keep being told the big bang theory is out of favour again.

Out of favour with whom?

Since the 1964 discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation by 964 by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson the “big bang” is virtually an unassailable scientific fact as possible to get.

Will

11 Mar 13 at 9:26 pm
I keep being told the big bang theory is out of favour again.

Out of favour with whom?

Since the 1964 discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson the “big bang” is virtually an unassailable scientific fact as it is possible to get.

Will

11 Mar 13 at 9:26 pm
Please nilk let that be scotch, and coke.

nilk, Sinc’s comma is doing some work here.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 9:27 pm
how’s Q & A going?
pearls of wisdom finely spelt by Garrott?

val majkus

11 Mar 13 at 9:29 pm
It is The Education Debate tonight. In the Red Corner we have Peter ‘well insulated’ Garrett with Snow Cone and in the blue corner we have Christopher ‘Poodle’ Pyne!

It is The Education Debate tonight. In the Red Corner we have Peter ‘well insulated’ Garrett with and in the blue corner we have Snow Cone, and in the blue corner we have Christopher ‘Poodle’ Pyne and the audience!

TFTFY

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 9:29 pm
Please nilk let that be scotch, and coke.

Welcome to my world.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:30 pm
I thought Garrett was the Minister for Plastic Bags, Batts and Fluffy Animals?

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:30 pm
val majkus, it hasn’t started yet.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 9:31 pm
PowerPoint update on that thread. Watto is heading home.

Poor Old Rafe

11 Mar 13 at 9:31 pm
ARgghhh!

It is The Education Debate tonight. In the Red Corner we have Peter ‘well insulated’ Garrett with ~~and in the blue corner we have~~ Snow Cone, and the audience andin the blue corner we have Christopher ‘Poodle’ Pyne

TFTFM&Y

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 9:31 pm
Where’s Sven?

Present and correct SAH.

and don’t call me sven.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:31 pm
Please nilk let that be scotch, and coke.

Too sweet.

Frozen Stoli is best to deal with the nausea

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 9:32 pm
There he is. Okay, all warriors accounted for.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 9:32 pm
I don’t have Stoli. I do, however, have 2 litres of vodka in the freezer, and with QandA the idea is not to savour the liquor. It’s for medicinal purposes only.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:33 pm
The Three Stooges, Gab?

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:34 pm
The sheer arrogance of the ABC in “roadblocking” this shitfest of a program on News Radio simultaneously with the telecast guarantees that I will support the abolition of everything but the rural stations. And I’m not even sure it’s safe to leave those.

Blogstrop

11 Mar 13 at 9:34 pm
It’s QandA time troops – lets get ready to rrrruuuummmmbbblllle.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:36 pm
Since the 1964 discovery of the cosmic microwave background radiation by 964 by Arno Penzias and Robert Wilson the “big bang” is virtually an unassailable scientific fact as possible to get

Agreed. But apparently the string theory stuff says – new model – but those who tell me this can’t seem to articulate the new model so I’m left waiting for …

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 9:37 pm
My god Lurch is one ugly fucker.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 9:39 pm
If we’re not in campaign mode, why are we debating policies?

Audience includes teachers, students and academics, along with others who have a stake in the issues.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:39 pm
It’s taking a very long time to refresh. Seems a lot of people tune in for the Cat’s Q&A dreunkblogging.

No pressure, guys.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 9:39 pm
I’ve now turned off No Shit Sherlock so I can tune into the web’t most incisive analysis of the slow suicide of the left.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 9:40 pm
Looks like the first question is about Gonski – show me the money and do it all on an ‘as needs’ basis.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:40 pm
Any greens candidates in the audience ready to have a tanty?

1st cab off the rank – a gonski hack. Bipartisanship?

Why can’t Pyne just say gonski is unfunded crap and sod off.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:41 pm
Pyne agrees on an ‘as needs’ funding model, points out that 80% of gov’t funding goes to state schools, which educate 66% of the students.

Garret goes the suck up to the questioner, who was on the Gonski panel.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:42 pm
That Douchebag who asked the first question is pushing like crazy for Grok-ski.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 9:43 pm
Great start by Pyne.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 9:43 pm
Lurch – ‘you rang’. Pyne is evil and he is all good.

Snow cone – what will you implement (pyne). The gubbamint should be coming up with the funding model.

Zing.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:43 pm
Two interruptions of Pyne by Jones.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 9:44 pm
Tony ! You’ve been pwned, all your base belong us.

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 9:44 pm
Jones cuts of Pyne and gives the con to Lurch.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 9:44 pm
Of course, Garret thinks Pyne is living in a parallel universe, Snow Cone talks over Pyne.

Looks like another yawnfest coming up.

Note Pyne looking direct to camera.

Garret now talking about States cuts to education, and how the schools need more money.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:44 pm
Want to run a book on how many times Pyne is interupted compared to Lurch?

How come lurch keeps calling all the questioners by their first name?

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:45 pm
By my back of the envelope reckoning, the abolition or defunding of the ABC would cover something approaching ten percent of the annual interest bill on the debt this mob of turkeys has run up.
It’s fitting that the facilitators, call them voter deceivers if you like, and I include the unions as well as the love media, should contribute significant amounts to balancing the books in the future.

Blogstrop

11 Mar 13 at 9:46 pm
Get ready to rumble. Q & A again. (a Quangocracy of Abasement)

Aliice

11 Mar 13 at 9:46 pm
Oops. Question about how Gonski will be funded.

Garrett: it’s all very clear in the report, and the model, it’s been detailed and comprehensive.

We have over a dozen funding models in the country, and we want to have a model for each individual school in the country.

SnowCone: although you’re here debating it, you’re not going to tell us anything about it? No costs, details?

Shorter Lurch: No.

Pyne: too late, she cried! You’ve been touting it for months, and not released any details to schools, so the gov’t can’t possibly expect schools to implement anything without information.

Original Questioner: schools don’t have the information so can’t work out their budgets.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:48 pm
Hey Tony ! Lurch just had about five minutes – and you bitched about the poodles time?

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 9:48 pm
I don’t know who that questioner is but he has his shit together.

Lurch waffles – ‘a new funding model’, the detail in six months.

Lurch you cretin.

A gonski panelist, god you can smell the rent seeking through the TV.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:49 pm
Shorter Lurch to OP: suck it up. You’ll get the info when we give it to you and implement it.

Gonski panellist: yes, there’s a lot that needs to be sorted yet, but Pyne talks of maintaining the status quo until that’s done. Can’t be having that or we’ll lose money.

Change is urgent.

ie “Show me the money!”

This is like Jerry Maguire Monday.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:50 pm
Interuptions;

Pyne 6

Lurch 0

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:51 pm
That s your 30 seconds – FCUK you tony , media watch ! Media watch! Where is media watch?

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 9:52 pm
aaand Snow Cone interrupts Pyne again.

Questioner: Why is the gov’t going on yet another spending spree when current reports say not to throw more money at it?

Lurch: shut up. more gonski – it’s all about the gaps in advantage between different schools (or something like that. He can’t even get his marxist boilerplate right).

Does anybody in this audience seriously think that pouring more money into the schools will not improve their performance?

nilk: yes.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:52 pm
So apropos to the discussion earlier today that JC raised about fathers being tricked, there was an item on Nein News this evening on a related subject. It was about the number of fathers who have been proven not to be with paternity tests and have been forking out thousands of dollars in the process. Since 2007 when the laws changed the number is nearly 800. Wow. In at least 100 cases the mother has been forced to hand back money paid in maintenance.

I know a bloke this has happened to. It must be absolutely devastating.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 9:53 pm
Just as well we’re not playing opposition interruptino bingo.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:54 pm
We need to move the debate to teacher quality. Good call pyne.

interruptions;

Pyne 7

Lurch 0

Pyne – “where’s your money’ [to lurch]

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:54 pm
But SfB QC you are positively around women. Have you made up any lies about Abbott lately? Things are getting worse old boy. Time to make up some more stories.

Tiny Dancer

11 Mar 13 at 9:56 pm
Bald dude with a ring in his eyebrow and beard says he wants to be an excellent English and History teacher in the public system because he cares. Wants more money for teachers.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 9:56 pm
Lurch can promise the world in confidence – there is no way he (and the govt) will have to actually deliver!

Spin spin spin while all the schools are burning!

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 9:56 pm
Garrett is an idiot.

Says Pyne shouldn’t be talking about values and outcomes.

Oh dear, luvvie wants to be english/history teacher in the state system so that children whose parents can’t afford a decent education.

His question: why won’t you give us more money for teachers and resources?

And of course it’s directed at Pyne (it’s called OPPOSITION for a reason numpty) rather than Garrett.

This could be because the questioner just has a hate on for the Libs (most likely) rather than accepting that Garrett/ALP are a pack of slavering morons who couldn’t find their arses in the dark with both hands.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 9:57 pm
First swampy of the evening gets a question.

Provide the funds for a quality learning environment.

WTF does that mean?

At least Pyne is showing some passion.

Lurch – opens with a lie, ‘A new national plan for school improvement’ Oh god he uses TLS and maxwell swan as credible references. Apparently it’s the fault of JWH.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:58 pm
Lord Nilk you need another drink love,you too Carpe

Tal

11 Mar 13 at 9:59 pm
Interuptions;

Pyne 8

Lurch 1/2

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 9:59 pm
Lurch – opens with a lie,

I’m shocked.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
LOL We’re absolutely committed to no student losing money.

But we’re still not going to tell you how we’re modelling it. Even though the model shows us how to do it, we’re not telling.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
who is Lurch?

val majkus

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
Howard Howard Howard… Is there a Godwin’s law equivalent?

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
Pyne: show me the model.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
Interuptions;

Pyne 8

Lurch 1/2

I’ve counted 9 Pyne.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
Lurch = Peter Garrett.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:00 pm
Pyne – nobody in the parliamentary enquirey has a model in front of them.

Zing.

Pyne is on fire tonight.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:01 pm
who is Lurch?

Garret of course.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:01 pm
Lurch-Garrett

Tal

11 Mar 13 at 10:01 pm
SnowCone: when you say that no school will lose funding, are you guaranteeing they won’t lose their indexation?

Lurch:does his best Bollard impersonation: No school will lose funding under a Gonski I implement.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:02 pm
Well take “that’s bullshit” as a comment!

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:03 pm
11 interruptions now

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:04 pm
Token student: evil Liberal State governments cut funding to schools.

Pyne: points out that the ALP have been cutting education. Over $3billion, the laptops and the rest.

Gasps of horror.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:04 pm
God Lurch is more ugly than a blind cobbler’s thumb.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:05 pm
Token student

What a rude little shit.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:05 pm
What Pyne is saying is “read the EFFING manual”. And here it is I’m all its glossy glory!

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:06 pm
What a rude little shit.

He’s a leftwing Q&A troll, what would you expect.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:06 pm
Next swampy – ‘what is your definition of a quality teacher’

She doesn’t seem articulate enought to be quality anything.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:07 pm
The problem for all these things like loading for disabilities, english language proficiencies and lower socio-economic areas is that they are also covered in centrelink payments and other benefits.

Next question of course, teacher wants to know what Pyne thinks a quality teacher is, and what (as a teacher of 15 years experience) is required of her?

Pyne: you should be able to teach and not worry about social programs. Impart the knowledge to your students so that they can fly and reach their full potential. You should be paid more for your skills and given the opportunity to reach your own potential as well.

Lurch: can’t have that, so we’ll interrupt with a news report where you’ve said poor performing teachers should be managed out of the system, and we’ll give you more gonski money.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:08 pm
Lurch quotes Pyne’s AFR comment that bad teachers should be managed out of the system. Lurch seems to think this is a bad thing?

Fme.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:08 pm
Twitter comment: what about the PARENTS?

Good point.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:08 pm
A miss-quote from Faux Facts —- where’s Tony: “we’ll take THAT as a comment”

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:09 pm
Lurch – quotes AFR, verballs Pyne.

Pyne – do you think under performing teachers should be kept in the system?

Lurch answers door for Gomez and waffles crap.

Follow up question – underperforming teachers.

Good answer from Pyne ‘then obviously thery are managed out of the system’

Lurch – still verballing Pyne. Holy Crap the gubbamint made another announcement today. more opportunities, mentoring, a new framework etc.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:11 pm
Is someone still keeping score of the interruptions?

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 10:12 pm
Question: (shorter verstion) what can we do about bad teachers?

Pyne: they should either be given a prof development plan to bring them up to scratch, and if that doesn’t work, get rid of them.

nilk: well duh.

Garrett: I’m a strong supporter of our teachers, and Pyne is not. So we’re going to give more mentoring, evaluation, and opportunities for young people who want to be teachers.

New q for Pyne: you come across as someone who prefers the old ‘chalk and talk’ method. These days it doesn’t quite cut it. Have you asked the students what sort of learning methods they prefer?

[FFS, are the kids voting? paying tax? if not, then they can stfu and learn their bloody times tables]

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:12 pm
Lord it’s a stacked audience. I’m trying to stick some paper to the left of the screen in order to keep Lurch head off the screen.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:12 pm
Mark Latham is a grub who Paul Murray needs to fire from his show. Latham is attacking Andrew Robb over Robbins not telling the truth about his depressive illness. Latham says because Robb lied he is not fit to be a minister in the next govt. Peter Reith was on as well and called out Latham, as did Janine Perrett and Paul.

Latham is a freaking idiot, in addition to being a colossal bore.

Better political commentary is available from the drunken yobbos at the local pub.

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:12 pm
Gillard clone greivance monger – ‘chalk and talk’, hang on that was how i was educated, i actually turned out ok.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:13 pm
Attempted gotcha after gotcha questions to the poodle. God I wish he had the guts to say and call them out.

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:13 pm
Numbers personifies everything that is wrong with teachers.
Remove the indoctrination, reinforce the basics (literacy, numeracy etc)
and get the militant unions the fuck out of the schools.
Chucking more money at a problem only excacerbates it. I still do not understand how throwing money at schools will improve outcomes. How does removing the “chalk & talk” methodology require more money?
Why do these people always want more money without being able to quantify how things will get better?

Huckleberry Chunkwot

11 Mar 13 at 10:13 pm
Pyne: I’ve never used ‘chalk and talk’ method, but look at some of the outcomes. We have remedial literacy lessons with phonics because whole word didn’t work for them.

Lurch to questioner: I feel your pain. There are so many different ways to teach in modern classrooms.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:14 pm
Is it only me who thinks Mark Latham does these show half cut?

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 10:14 pm
So ‘chalk and talk’ doesn’t quite cut it, although since the adoption of other methods, educational standards are falling.

Of course the two are not related.

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:15 pm
Great, Q&A sticks a disabled kid on with a question that no one understands. Lurch answers the question by bringing up Gonski.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:15 pm
Pyne is doing very well tonight…very happy.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 10:15 pm
Question from kid with some disability. (I’m waiting for a cry of “FREE WHEELCHAIRS” )

In all seriousness, he doesn’t like being called a retard – he has a speech impediment, and a point – and wants more assistance.

Pyne believes there should be a bipartisan approach for dealing with children with disabilities. He’s got 4 kids, 2 who have disabilities.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:16 pm
Token disability kid – doesn’t like being called a retard.

Fine we’ll make a special school just for you.

Lurch – we’ll throw 200 million at it.

Pyne – no room to play politics with children in school.

Great we’ll just provide the ‘support’.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:16 pm
Video question: I got to school in the country and it’s so hard to study when I’m so far from anything.

I don’t have any access to the libraries, or the internet, or, say the Khan Academy so I can be proactive and take charge of my own education, so what are you going to do for me?

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:17 pm
The paper block didn’t work. Lurch now is in the middle of the screen. Damn.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:18 pm
Dismissive

If Latham is not drunk, he has some serious problems.

He is a big turn off with his absolute bs and his aggression. Did you see him on Sunday Agenda talking over Geoff Gallup?

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:18 pm
What are you going to do for country kids? Lurch misses opportunity to,spruik the NBN. Dumb bastard, [and I'm surprised that he wasn't given a looksee at the questions !].

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:19 pm
Oops. sorry. That last was my re-interpretation of the poor dear’s question.

Lurch got to mention the NBN. SKOL!

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:19 pm
Lurch – digital technology, gonski, NBN. Please just fvck off and die.

Pyne online virtual education, needs resources.

Is there a bucket of money i don’t know about?

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:20 pm
Great, A limey now asking a question. All we need is a whiny pom.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:20 pm
Latham is attacking Andrew Robb over Robbins not telling the truth about his depressive illness. Latham says because Robb lied he is not fit to be a minister in the next govt

Oh.my.god.

M0nty is…Mark Latham.

twostix

11 Mar 13 at 10:20 pm
I don’t have any access to the libraries, or the internet, or, say the Khan Academy

NILK IS ON FIRE

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 10:22 pm
I applaud those of you able to sit thru QandA.

I can’t do it. Well done.

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:23 pm
teaching educator bemoaning the casualisation of teachers. How can we fix this? It’s so hard for them.

My view? Well if schools could get rid of underperforming teachers they would be more likely to hire.

It’s not rocket science.

Lurch: we’ll get

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:24 pm
It’s just the look of him. He sits in his chair like a sack, looks at no-one and snipes wildly while also searching for words and phrases.

Having seen him mostly on PM live, I was assuming he just hated Murray and the other panellists but yes with these other shows, I reckon he may need 5 or 6 bracers to get up for the shows these days.

I’ve worked with a few people with that performance and two of them were actually alcoholics; discovered later. The other was just a jerk.

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 10:25 pm
Jeremy Sear ‏@jeremysear

Pyne’s performance is amazing. I think Abbott has a real vote-winning challenger there. Imagine the Libs’ vote with Pyne in charge! #qanda

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:25 pm
Academic asking for more tenure.

Look love, my tenure is the next trade. Fuck off.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:26 pm
Jenna Price ‏@JennaPrice

Every year about this time I wonder whether #qanda can manage an all-woman panel ever? #iwd

lol. I don’t care what chomosomes the debaters have. Idiot.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:26 pm
timhollo ‏@timhollo

Here’s an idea: get Gina and Twiggy to pay more tax, then we can properly fund public schools. #QandA

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:27 pm
M0nty is…Mark Latham

OMG ………………

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:28 pm
Back from system crash.

Interuptions;

Pyne 16

Lurch 1

(but i did make 2 whiskeys) so i missed a bit.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:28 pm
Oh Jeez… we get a side shot of Lurch. ABC outdoing themselves this evening.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:28 pm
I think that the poodle will be (deservedly) PM one day.

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:29 pm
I applaud those of you able to sit thru QandA.

I can’t do it. Well done.

Seconded – I turned on ABC 24, but lasted less than four minutes.

squawkbox

11 Mar 13 at 10:29 pm
Gay student on vid question. Wants more done on teaching kids in primary school how to be gay.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:29 pm
Lurch is in the punch-drunk phase.

Pyne has absolutely pummeled him tonight.

I almost feel sorry for the sad b-stard

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 10:30 pm
More on “teacher quality” & Lurch says, ‘we care and they don’t.’

Under gonski, we would expect to see every teacher to be evaluated, and have a plan to become the teacher they want to be.

It’s all about the teachers.

Not much about the students tonight.

Video from obligatory gay teen boy, and how hard it is. He felt like a mistake and unloved, and not enough is being done.

Should primary school children get given education all about being gay?

[they already get it. see Family Life Inc. Kinsey’s acolytes have been pushing this shi’ite for decades.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:30 pm
Gay question??? Relevance?

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 10:31 pm
Video question – Duncan was scared and depressed, he liked boys, he was upset and felt unloved.

Thinks schools should now become depression counselling centres.

Oh FFS – they are places of learning not a fvcking outreach centre. I didn’t send my kids to school to be counselled on drugs or sexuality or sexual identity.

Just.sod.off

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:31 pm
oh dear, Lurch hasn’t spoken much about curriculum, but it’s coming up, and for a choice like this, it shoudl be handled sensitively.

How many will pick up on Lurch’s characterisation of gayness as a “choice”?????

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:32 pm
I can’t do it. Well done

Drinking helps.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:32 pm
I was assuming he just hated Murray and the other panellists

Safe bet IMO. I reckon Latham pissed off Paul tonight and I would be surprised to see him back. Latham was a disgrace.

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:32 pm
Video question – Duncan was scared and depressed, he liked boys, he was upset and felt unloved.

That could very well have been Kero boy, you know.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:33 pm
Well, we already knew that the gaystapo were working on getting further into the education system. This confirms it for me. Glad my kid’s not just starting out.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:33 pm
What about same sex marriage?

Where is the fairness Tony?

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 10:33 pm
Great – end of the night and they finally start talking about non-government schools.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:34 pm
I missed it tonight – so sad
Everyone loves a meltdown!

dismissive

11 Mar 13 at 10:34 pm
What about same sex marriage?

Where is the fairness Tony?

What no gay marriage question. Duncan the depressed gay kid who wants to get to primary schoolers came close. (ya know priests have gone to jail for stuff like that).

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:36 pm
Isn’t it the case that we are falling behind global educational stands BECAUSE we are spending more time on gay rights, Eco fascism, equality and other luvvie issues rather than Readin’ Riting and Rithmetic’

Priorities please,

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:36 pm
Pynes has a minute – Principal autonomy, independant public schools (good) [how about vouchers for real choice for parents].

Lurch – national partnerships, teacher quality, funding model (i thought they had one), wants more state money, gonski, gonski, new fair and efffective funding, gonski.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:37 pm
LOL, JC.

Pyne points out that the government paying a bit to private schools saves billions.

Coalition believes in principal autonomy, because when the principal has that, then parents are happier.

Garrett: we’ve had a period of 5 years of education changes, and now we’re all gonski. We’ve a national plan, matched by the Feds and a fair share from the States.

FFS I speak better commie claptrap than he does, and I aren’t one.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:37 pm
You folks really out-did yourselves tonight.
Magnificent.
What was the final interruptions tally

Keith

11 Mar 13 at 10:37 pm
So Carpe, what was the final interruptions tally and do you mind if I use it elsewhere?

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 10:37 pm
Drinking helps.

Not really. The amount I need to drink to sit thru the shite means I pass out on the couch and have a hangover the next day. Far better to read the Cat for the ongoing report.

Dianeh

11 Mar 13 at 10:38 pm
Pity the Goulburn Lockout didn’t get a run beyond the brief mention from Pyne. It would have been an eye opener!

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:38 pm
The gay kid should be loved at home, taught at school.

JUST LIKE EVERY KID.

This idea that the government has to give you cuddles is a fucking pathology. The government is an abstraction! It can’t love you! ONLY PEOPLE CAN.

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 10:39 pm
Priorities please,

Thats why Lady Jugs & i sent our kids to private school.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:39 pm
All y’all missed the true, golden ABC circus tonight.

Four Corners dealt with the Obeid scandal in NSW.

NOT ONE Liberal was interviewed.

All of the good guys were Obeid’s ALP colleagues – like Carr and ‘party elder’ John Falkener; they decried the enormity and criminality of it all. They were the victims.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 10:39 pm
Who was “Kero Boy” again …. I forget

Nanuestalker

11 Mar 13 at 10:40 pm
Thats why Lady Jugs

Dude!

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:40 pm
Interuptions;

I’m going with

Pyne 17

Lurch 1

but i missed a bit making a couple of drinks.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:41 pm
Who was “Kero Boy” again …. I forget

Hammygar. He once talked about rubbing himself out for social justice. …. he thinks it would help the original owners or some shit like that.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:42 pm
Dude!

It’s a joke first coined by a blogger from Korea, the wife still laughs at it.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:42 pm
Peter Garrett only talked about inputs. The only problem is that the outputs are terrible from those policies.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 10:43 pm
Oh yeah … LOL!

Nanuestalker

11 Mar 13 at 10:43 pm
QandA is my drinking night. Of course, as a two pot screamer it doesn’t take much lol.

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:43 pm
Thats why Lady Jugs & i sent our kids to private school.

And why I will be doing the same from Year 7 onwards.

Thanks everyone for the updates.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 10:44 pm
Lady Jugulum = Lady Jugs

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:44 pm
Drinking made that bearable. Thanks for the advice Cats!

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 10:44 pm
Q&A, as a soapbox for the left, has become a showcase of everything that has gone wrong with Australia in the past 40 years. You can find the whole pathology here: the ABC as a propaganda organisation that regards the middle class with contempt and the political class terrified of what is about to happen to them at the ballot box because democracy is their enemy.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 10:46 pm
It’s sad that lefties perceive people who go to non-government schools as the rich kids. Parents who send kids to private schools, including my parents, actually give up a lot to do so.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 10:46 pm
Well troops – that was QandA. we gird our loins, flex our bull like necks and heft our mighty weapons and wade through the bilges of televised swill so you don’t have to.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:47 pm
Carr now on from a 4 corners short talking about Eddie on the little rat’s Liar’s Party propaganda show.

Carr passes the buck.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:47 pm
ABC as a propaganda organisation that regards the middle class with contempt

True, but the middle class (for want of a better term) also seeks their information online and from multiple sources.

As a result people have become more astute with their BS detectors and have begone to see the ALPBC as the shills they are.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:49 pm
Thanks, Team Cat. I’m off to hit the hay now. Another fun monday night had by all.

Except for poor, unloved Duncan.

(I thought his name was Tim for some reason)

nilk

11 Mar 13 at 10:50 pm
Monday night is premium entertainment at the Cat. Thanks to all who made it possible, especially Nilk, Jugs and JC, but every input was golden.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 10:51 pm
Newspoll: 2 Party Preferred: ALP 48 (+3) L/NP 52 (-3)
Primary Votes: ALP 34 (+3) L/NP 44 (-3)
Preferred PM: Gillard 42 (+6) Abbott 38 (-2)

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 10:52 pm
Thanks guys. Im glad I only have to skim rather than watch it.

nic

11 Mar 13 at 10:52 pm
Still on Q&A – was there actually a single question to Lurch from a “conservative” view point? FMD, but the bias just stinks. Down to the Dorothy Dixer that allowed Lurch to flash the highlighted quote from Faux Facts to a Oh So Conveniently placed camera!

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:53 pm
vLurch = Peter Garrett.

i prefer to call him Voldemort. Lurch at least had hair and could play an instrument.

Voldemort was also good at smoking people, like pink batt installer’s

Splatacrobat

11 Mar 13 at 10:53 pm
Newspoll is havin a larf surely?

nic

11 Mar 13 at 10:54 pm
I am glad Labor has had a bounce. Gillard will stay PM now.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 10:54 pm
Mark Latham is a grub who Paul Murray needs to fire from his show. Latham is attacking Andrew Robb over Robbins not telling the truth about his depressive illness.

ROTFLMAO,
Pot, kettle, black.

Rob

11 Mar 13 at 10:56 pm
ooow look, LP have a post on the same Q&A episode.

http://larvatusprodeo.net/archives/2013/03/god-give-me-strength-live-blogging-the-qa-edu-special/

The commentary is a bit different to that here.
Glad I didn’t watch it, everyone hates it.

jumpnmcar

11 Mar 13 at 10:56 pm
Twitter suggests Gillard getting the sympathy vote.

Anyway, good. She’ll keep her job for another fortnight. Gillard and Swan need to face the electorate, not get shuffled off.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 10:57 pm
I prefer to call him Voldemort. Lurch at least had hair and could play an instrument.

Through the program I was wondering what he’d look like with a rug. Still not good.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 10:57 pm
Well troops i shan’t be here for Q&A next week, fortunately (From Saturday morning) i shall be in Kobe at the north end of Mt Sawa at our new humble home.

Unfortunately i shall have to explain to Lady J why i resigned my job before getting a new one.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:57 pm
Newspoll is as accurate as a scud missile.

The only explanation is that they are cooking it to fuck with the redheaded usurper’s head.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 10:58 pm
Newspol is such a yo yo. I’m losing faith in its accuracy – unless the conspiracy theorists are right in that DaMurdoch is fucking around with the ALP and ensuring TLS is destabilised – but not enough to be dumped!

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 10:58 pm
I was wondering what he’d look like with a rug

Shave a chimp and leave it with a mohawk or strap a toupee to your bum.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 10:59 pm
Newspoll: 2 Party Preferred: ALP 48 (+3) L/NP 52 (-3)

Thank goodness. How stupid were we? [Gillard] is our one true leader and we will vote her back into office given a chance at an election to reaffirm her strong leadership qualities.

What? Labor’s still behind? Not for long. Monty will show up shortly to assure us it’s only a matter of time.

[Slight edit - that was defamatory. Sinc]

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:00 pm
Our friends at LP have a dedicated Q&A thread – with comments. Can you imagine? Anyway if you’re brave enough venture forth.

I was thinking earlier that we should have a dedicated Q&A thread every week separate from the Open thread. Any thoughts? Might be quicker to load.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:01 pm
Sinclair, I think we should have a thread for suggestions to create new threads. #sarc

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 11:02 pm
thanks guys, I didn’t watch but it was a delight to read the comments
but I still don’t understand why ‘lurch’ = garrett
lurchers have more hair than that

val majkus

11 Mar 13 at 11:04 pm
Andrew – isn’t it past your bedtime?

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:04 pm
Anyone listening to Emo on Lateline? The only reason its still on here is that the remote is no where near me.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 11:04 pm
I was thinking earlier that we should have a dedicated Q&A thread every week separate from the Open thread.

Excellent suggestion.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 11:04 pm
Newspoll used to be heralded as accurate and steady.

For a year now it’s been a yo-yo.

It has had 3-4 results in that time that have sandbagged Gillard at very threatening moments.

Some things never change though such as Emmo talkin’ rapid-fire shite on Lateline

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 11:04 pm
Vote for dedicated Q&A thread.

wreckage

11 Mar 13 at 11:05 pm
Yes, Sinc. Just do it.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:05 pm
Newspoll: 2 Party Preferred: ALP 48 (+3) L/NP 52 (-3)
Primary Votes: ALP 34 (+3) L/NP 44 (-3)
Preferred PM: Gillard 42 (+6) Abbott 38 (-2)

Absolute fucking Gold!
Now they have to keep her, Rudd and his band have been stopped in their tracks.
What’s the bet that the next Newspoll will be 56/44 after the finish of this parliamentary session? Then we will have another (6?) weeks of leadership debate before the budget session.
You could not write a script like this.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

11 Mar 13 at 11:05 pm
Emo just talked about the Coalition moving the tax free threshold back from 18000 to 6000. No word about the low income offset.

dover_beach

11 Mar 13 at 11:07 pm
we should have a dedicated Q&A thread every week

Do it.

You know you want to.

We sally forth every week into the alpbc sludge wearing our armour plated hazmat suits with asbestos undies so you nice folk don’t have to, i think these brave warriors of the 21st fighting keyboards deserve it.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:07 pm
‘lurch’ = garrett
lurchers have more hair than that

Can I fess up to an error. When I first tagged him as Lurch I was confused with Lurch and Uncle Fester. I stuck with Lurch.

Sorry.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:07 pm
In all seriousness, we do not need a new thread for Qanda. We have the open forum, which discusses topics other than the already created blog topics.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 11:08 pm
Our friends at LP have a dedicated Q&A thread – with comments.

Gee, I wonder where they got that idea from?

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 11:09 pm
I stuck with Lurch

But lurch works;

Tall
Pasty
acromegaly
incoherant
uncoordinated

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:09 pm
We’ll experiment next week and see how it goes. I’ll set it up for 9pm.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:10 pm
Sinc, note taken about that defamation. My apology for dumping you in it.

[No worries. There is a fine line and easy to fall on the wrong side. Sinc]

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:10 pm
Carpe

It wasn’t the lack of hand eye coordination that struck me. It was the shaved gleaming cue ball.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:11 pm
That Newspoll result is hysterical. They are single handedly keeping Gillard in a job at the minute. I’ll be curious to see if the other polls remain more or less in alignment as they have been recently.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 11:11 pm
Emmo after a veritable record non-stop diatribe of verbal diarrhea has just finished.

It felt like a 2 hour lecture on the wonders of modern preventative dentistry

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 11:11 pm
Can we have a thread for ‘ol leathery’s show?

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 11:12 pm
NO.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 11:13 pm
If Snowcone gets his own thread then Ol’ Leathery should get his Sunday morning one too.

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 11:13 pm
What’s you do now Tom?

Easy does it. Just make lots of fun of them. It hurts more you know.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:13 pm
we do not need a new thread for Qanda

Andrew – when a thread like this has over 800 comments the refresh rate slows too much.

I appreciate your point, but my laptop crashed once trying to refresh and gave up the ghost twice in net connection.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:13 pm
IT, CL – you’re screwed. I’ve known it all alone. You are benevolent sexists.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:13 pm
I was thinking earlier that we should have a dedicated Q&A thread every week separate from the Open thread. Any thoughts? Might be quicker to load.

Great idea. I don’t contribute often but the commentary is a must have accessory to sitting through it.

As an aside , My favorite wife was a school librarian for years.

She had the password “bureau” as her password on the library computer and made no secret of it, but was confident that the teachers would not access the PC as they would not be able to spell it.

Ripper

11 Mar 13 at 11:14 pm
Ha ha ha! Good old Newspoll!

Fisky

11 Mar 13 at 11:14 pm
I used to really despise Paul Murray on Sky News but of recent times he has been excellent.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 11:14 pm
How about this.. how about a Insiders/4 corners/ media watch/Q&A thread starting sunday morning?

That way we keep it all together as a seamless commentary on those morons.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:15 pm
I request a specific weekly thread for gay marriage, because it is such an important election issue.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 11:15 pm
We’ll experiment next week and see how it goes

Great – the one week i’m not here.

I’ll try to see if i can stream off asahi.net, but i doubt it.

(how great is this place, they make beer and do net connections)

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:16 pm
IT, CL – you’re screwed. I’ve known it all alone. You are benevolent sexists.

Sinc, dunno about IT but CL has always been a hip man. He likes big hips. Am I wrong?

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:17 pm
How about the weekly alpbc thread?

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:17 pm
Sinc – CL likes women with big bums and small boobs. It’s a rather South American ideal of beauty.

I on the other hand am guilty as charged.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 11:18 pm
No. No.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 11:18 pm
Andrew – we have a permanent marriage thread.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:20 pm
Tom, I was kidding.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 11:20 pm
IT, it starts with this ‘liking women’ business. He probably opens doors and carries the shopping and stuff. It’s all sexist.

JC – yes. It is a hip thing. I thought it was boobs too. Sorry CL.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:21 pm
Ok troops – i’m off to bed, another enjoyable Monday.

Thanks to you all. Play nice.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:22 pm
Sinc’s idea of a Q&A thread is the correct one, IMO. Insiders works fine in the OT because Sunday morning is usually a low-traffic period.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:22 pm
Can I fess up to an error. When I first tagged him as Lurch I was confused with Lurch and Uncle Fester. I stuck with Lurch.

Sorry.

Nah… Don’t be. Ted Cassidy is absolutely perfect. Check him out here:
http://en.memory-alpha.org/wiki/Ted_Cassidy?file=Ruk.jpg

“You rang?”

Arnost

11 Mar 13 at 11:23 pm
CL likes women with big bums and small boobs

Sure. That’s why he likes Christina Hendricks, for her small boobs.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 11:25 pm
A gay marriage thread is also a high-traffic issue therefore we should create such a thread to cater for the hipsters that will arrive to the blog.

Andrew

11 Mar 13 at 11:25 pm
I thought it was boobs too.

I pobably should have clarified that comment earlier.

Carpe Jugulum

11 Mar 13 at 11:26 pm
Andrew, we have a marriage thread. The gay marriage issue was the primary reason it was created.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:26 pm
Sure. That’s why he likes Christina Hendricks, for her small boobs.

No, he likes her because her body was carved out of stone by a sex maniac. It’s magnificent.

Infidel Tiger

11 Mar 13 at 11:28 pm
I was thinking what Gab thought. And Nigela too.

Sinclair Davidson

11 Mar 13 at 11:32 pm
No, he likes her because her body was carved out of stone by a sex maniac. It’s magnificent.

So not her norks then?

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 11:34 pm
I was thinking that CL was a boobs and bum man myself. That’s something I heartily agree with BTW.

tbh

11 Mar 13 at 11:34 pm
9 comments on the LP threqad.

x2 particularly stupid ones by a ‘paul burns’.

Who sounds like the long lost leftist nutter FDB

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 11:36 pm
Where is CL to answer to these claims and counter claims.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:36 pm
x2 particularly stupid ones by a ‘paul burns’.

He’s a first rate nutball. I honestly don’t know how he knows how to walk and eat.

JC

11 Mar 13 at 11:38 pm
IT is the most technically correct. It’s not just the funbags. It’s the Venutian curves.

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:39 pm
The Cat’s great, innit? From discussing Q&A now segued into a discussion about Cl’s boob/hip preferences.

The Cat – it’s just not an ordinary blog.

Gab

11 Mar 13 at 11:40 pm
ALP leadership anarchy at breaking point as MPs meet to discuss crisis

Tom

11 Mar 13 at 11:53 pm
ALP leadership anarchy at breaking point as MPs meet to discuss crisis

Oh no!

Don’t tell me there is more instabilidy in da labor partee

JamesK

11 Mar 13 at 11:57 pm
LOL.

Boobs vs. Bum/Hips dedicated thread now!

No no. IT is right. I’m not boobularly dogmatic, size-wise.

Never have been.

Shape in the hippal/bottomal department is king.

Or queen, I guess.

C.L.

11 Mar 13 at 11:58 pm
So, only a 3 point swap from Coalition to Labor may see PM Gillard returned 51/49? And Greens vote has recovered.

That’s not too bad, with 6 months to go to an election.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 12:07 am
From boobabile to papabile…

Some late mail coming through that cardinals in Rome will go into conclave tomorrow rather angry with the Italians. This somewhat works against my theory that they might want an Italian to effortlessly read and deal with curial politics and crises. The value of making a poacher the game warden still holds true, though – but the vibe is vectoring towards a ‘foreigner’ again.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 12:12 am
Apologies for ever doubting you, IT.

Gab

12 Mar 13 at 12:12 am
Overrated Queensland ponce spits the dummy:

Sacked vice-captain Shane Watson says he will contemplate quitting Test cricket after leaving India only hours after he was one of four Australian players stood down for Thursday’s third Test.

Watson was made unavailable for the third leg of the series, alongside fast bowlers James Pattinson and Mitchell Johnson, and back-up batsman Usman Khawaja, for a breach of team discipline. Head coach Mickey Arthur said the quartet had failed to comply with requests to deliver a presentation, by email or in person, on what they bring to the team in the wake of last week’s heavy defeat in Hyderabad.

The stunning development leaves Australia with only 13 players in contention for the match – 12 if wicketkeeperMatthew Wade does not recover from a bruised ankle.

While veteran gloveman Brad Haddin was already in the air as cover for Wade, Watson flew in the opposite direction from Chandigarh. The 31-year-old quit the tour on Monday afternoon to be with his heavily pregnant wife Lee, who was due to give birth at the end of the month. He said he was “absolutely shattered” to be stood down and would weigh up his future in Test cricket.

“Any time you’re suspended for a Test match unless you do something unbelievably wrong, and obviously everyone knows what those rules are . . . I think it is very harsh,” Watson said.

“At this point in time I’m at a stage where I’m sort of weighing up my future and what I want to do with my cricket in general, to be honest. I do love playing, there is no doubt about that, but at this point in time I’m going to spend the next few weeks with my family and just weigh up my options of just exactly which direction I want to go.

“I’m going to have to sit down and talk that through with my family. There are lot more important things in life – I certainly do love playing cricket and that passion is still there and I feel like I’m in the prime years of my cricket career. From that perspective I still feel like I’ve got a lot to give. But from a holistic perspective I’ve got to sit down with my family and decide which directions they are.”

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 12:32 am
Boobs.

Perfectly understandable that the boobs on the ABC would lead to discussion of tits, bums and curves.

kae

12 Mar 13 at 12:33 am
Am I the only one for whom the Cat has suddenly become slow-loading?

——————————

I think he has a right to be pissed off, Tom.

He was sacked for not attending a wanking session with PowerPoint.

I’d be embarrassed to be part of that team.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 12:38 am
I’ve got a piece of advice for you Shane: become a better cricketer and contribute more with the bat and ball you peanut.

tbh

12 Mar 13 at 12:39 am
I have returned.

dover_beach

12 Mar 13 at 10:55 am
Tom Friedman Number One ‘serious’ foreign policy columnist for the New York Slimes – and nutter leftist wants more nutter leftists screamin’ an’ screechin’ including our very own Bill McKibben:

No to Keystone. Yes to Crazy.

I HOPE the president turns down the Keystone XL oil pipeline. (Who wants the U.S. to facilitate the dirtiest extraction of the dirtiest crude from tar sands in Canada’s far north?) But I don’t think he will. So I hope that Bill McKibben and his 350.org coalition go crazy. I’m talking chain-themselves-to-the-White-House-fence-stop-traffic-at-the-Capitol kind of crazy, because I think if we all make enough noise about this, we might be able to trade a lousy Keystone pipeline for some really good systemic responses to climate change. We don’t get such an opportunity often — namely, a second-term Democratic president who is under heavy pressure to approve a pipeline to create some jobs but who also has a green base that he can’t ignore. So cue up the protests, and pay no attention to people counseling rational and mature behavior. We need the president to be able to say to the G.O.P. oil lobby, “I’m going to approve this, but it will kill me with my base. Sasha and Malia won’t even be talking to me, so I’ve got to get something really big in return.”

That a prominent broadsheet newspaper publishes drivel like this from a nutter like this tells you all you need to know about “quality journalism” – and our future, God help us.

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 10:58 am
You would have to be barking mad to believe the greens vote went up when an actual election on the weekend showed the greens vote dropping 30 %, which is in line with all the other state elections.

Is also no good hoping for a strong greens showing on the back of labor preferences when the labor primary vote will end up I the 30% range.

Whoever is running Newspoll these days is an evil genius. It must be Rupert himself pulling the strings. No doubt doing it while laughing with Gina as Tony serves them tea.

brc

12 Mar 13 at 10:58 am
“I’m going to approve this, but it will kill me with my base. Sasha and Malia won’t even be talking to me, so I’ve got to get something really big in return.”

Always targetting the kids.

It’s the leftist way.

twostix

12 Mar 13 at 11:06 am
More from The New York Slimes: Global Temperatures Highest in 4,000 Years

Global temperatures are warmer than at any time in at least 4,000 years, scientists reported Thursday, and over the coming decades are likely to surpass levels not seen on the planet since before the last ice age.

Previous research had extended back roughly 1,500 years, and suggested that the rapid temperature spike of the past century, believed to be a consequence of human activity, exceeded any warming episode during those years. The new work confirms that result while suggesting the modern warming is unique over a longer period.

Even if the temperature increase from human activity that is projected for later this century comes out on the low end of estimates, scientists said, the planet will be at least as warm as it was during the warmest periods of the modern geological era, known as the Holocene, and probably warmer than that.

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 11:07 am
Another classic column from Mark Steyn in The Australian. It’s a Disaster Movie every second week in the age of Obama. Boobs also get mentioned.

Australia is running on a parallel course, with pollies of a similar philosophical bent, but here they’re trying a different tack. On the surface they’re trying to look like a James Stewart movie, on the side of the modern family, truth (as long as it’s ABC/Fairfax truth), social justice, and the Australian way – announcing a feelgood scheme a week, devil take the deficit!
But it’s coming across as more like Underbelly.

blogstrop

12 Mar 13 at 11:13 am
You would have to be barking mad to believe the greens vote went up when an actual election on the weekend showed the greens vote dropping 30 %, which is in line with all the other state elections.

In some respects polls are lightly masked ‘how-cool-are-you’ tests.

Somebody rings up a right thinking luvvie in Balmain and asks whether they’re going to vote for the greens, of course they say yes.

Then they go and vote for Labor like they always do.

twostix

12 Mar 13 at 11:20 am
Krugman indicates that the IMF agrees with him on the “austerity trap”.

Krugman has a knack for expressing his views in a pretty clear and simple manner.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 11:22 am
Krugman has a knack for expressing his views in a pretty clear and simple manner.

Krugman has a knack for demonstrating that he’s an uncouth arsewipe with a sociopathic disregard for social graces too

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 11:29 am
Krugman has a knack for demonstrating that he’s an uncouth arsewipe with a sociopathic disregard for social graces too

It’s logical that liar-steve® idolises him

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 11:30 am
Protesters burn Christian homes in Pakistan

AFP – Thousands of angry protesters on Saturday set ablaze more than 100 houses of Pakistani Christians over a blasphemy row in the eastern city of Lahore, officials said.

Over 3,000 Muslim protesters turned violent over derogatory remarks against Prophet Mohammed allegedly made by a young Christian, Sawan Masih, 28, three days earlier, police official Multan Khan said.

The exact number of houses in Joseph Colony, a Christian neighbourhood in Badami Bagh area, were not immediately known but police and rescue officials said they belonged to low to middle-class families from the minority community.

“Police arrested Masih, a sanitary worker, on Friday night while the incident actually happened on Wednesday evening,” Khan told AFP.

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 11:32 am
LA Times: Iran’s president raises eyebrows with behavior at Chavez funeral

TEHRAN — President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, long at odds with Iran’s powerful clerical establishment, appears to have once again risked the wrath of the nation’s mullahs.

This time, Ahmadinejad flouted Shiite Islamic traditions while attending the state funeral in Caracas of the late President Hugo Chavez, a close ally of the Iranian president.

At the globally televised services in Caracas on Friday, a visibly weeping Ahmadinejad hugged Chavez’s grieving elderly mother, Elena Frias de Chavez.

Iran’s Shiite clerics hold that it is forbidden for a man to touch a female who is not a close relative, such as a wife, daughter or sister.

Ahmadinejad also bowed before and kissed Chavez’s flag-draped coffin, which had a large crucifix as its backdrop.

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 11:36 am
Mary Anastasia O’Grady, WSJ: Chávez ‘The Redeemer’

Barack Obama’s first term was not kind to many Americans. Yet when a presidential-election exit poll in November asked voters which candidate “cares about people like me,” President Obama beat Mitt Romney by a staggering 81% to 18%.

You can blame that on Mr. Romney, but I think it has mostly to do with the cult of personality. And it was something to bear in mind last week as tens of thousands of Venezuelans in the streets of Caracas tearfully mourned the death of Hugo Chávez. Many of the poor may authentically believe that the dictator cared for them. But that doesn’t mean that he made them better off. He didn’t.

The results of the U.S. exit poll seemed highly illogical. Americans had endured four years of stubbornly high unemployment, stagnant wage growth, and rising gas and food prices. Yet Mr. Obama remained connected with the voters, as the exit poll and election outcome demonstrated.

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 11:39 am
Whoever is running Newspoll these days is an evil genius. It must be Rupert himself pulling the strings. No doubt doing it while laughing with Gina as Tony serves them tea.

Hahahaha!!! I think even the leftoid zombiesphere is now paranoid about Newspoll. I suspect it is less about conspiracies and more about a polling company cutting costs by halving its sample size in the past year from 2200 to 1100, perhaps also with an ill-advised tweaking of data-collection methods. Yesterday’s Essential Report (sample: 1900) has none of Newspoll’s volatility: 2PP 45-55% Labor-Coalition.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 11:44 am
An excellent read on the Roxonation of Australian culture by the new fascist puritans of the left.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 12:00 pm
I presume Michael Smith himself edited and posted this YouTube video of Gary Gray getting off a plane from Perth and man-handling a female reporter who asked him about Gillard’s leadership. Not a good look, especially since it featured on both 7.30 and Lateline on Their ABC. Oh, the misogyny!

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 12:11 pm
Defamation.

Cardinal Pell angered by newspaper smear.

I hope lying turd Paul Collins and Fairfax have plenty of money.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 12:33 pm
It seems Labor’s fascist media laws have been adopted by cabinet

Andrew

12 Mar 13 at 12:40 pm
Indeed, it would appear ex-union gangster Stephen Conroy has secured caucus support for his regulatory vendetta against News Limited:

THE Labor caucus has approved sweeping media reforms after an early morning cabinet meeting signed off on long-awaited changes, including a controversial public interest test that could block big industry mergers.

The Australian can confirm that the media reforms went to federal caucus this morning, shortly after the cabinet meeting, and that MPs agreed to the changes in principle, subject to closer scrutiny by a caucus committee in the next few days.

The additional oversight by the caucus committee is not expected to delay a public announcement of the changes.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy gained caucus approval for a “public interest test” to vet media proprietors – a contentious new layer of regulation that is fiercely resisted by most large media companies.

There will be three bills to enact the reforms, including media diversity safeguards and a new agency to oversee the public interest test.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 12:51 pm
media diversity safeguards

Fairfax bailout imminent.

twostix

12 Mar 13 at 12:57 pm
Bring back burning

Try them
Convict them
Burn them

WhaleHunt Fun

12 Mar 13 at 12:58 pm
Napthine has reinstalled $200 million worth of TAFE funding that Ted B cut. Personally, the cut was not the problem. The explanation was. TAFE’s could operate on much lower costs and offer courses that result in real employment.

Andrew

12 Mar 13 at 1:04 pm
What do you think the court awarded damages for “ruined my chance at being Pope” should run at, CL?

Actually, the statement issued by Pell (if reported correctly by the SMH) does not reflect accurately what the original SMH report said. (It does not say

And there is still no indication that the report means that Collins himself was amongst the progressive Catholics who lobbied the Cardinals about the 2002 investigation.

Please let me know when it is established that Collins was not just reporting what he knew had happened.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 1:04 pm
Indeed, it would appear ex-union gangster Stephen Conroy has secured caucus support for his regulatory vendetta against News Limited:

I think I’m going to be ill. The man is without question the worst fascist ever to be elected to federal parliament. Nothing would give me more pleasure than firstly seeing him despatched from the senate at the next election and then conveyed immediately to gaol for being an anti-freedom totalitarian nutcase.

tbh

12 Mar 13 at 1:04 pm
What do you think the court awarded damages for “ruined my chance at being Pope” should run at, CL?

You really are a morally evil cur, Steve.

The defamation consists in Paul Collins and Fairfax openly saying and reporting that Cardinal Pell is an unindicted child rapist.

This is a lie.

Collins yesterday:

”The judge never cleared Pell and that has rendered Pell irrelevant. He has no chance,” Dr Collins, a former priest, said.

Fairfax today, tries to avoid a law suit:

The inquiry, headed by independent commissioner Alex Southwell QC, cleared Dr Pell of allegations he molested a boy during a camp at Phillip Island, in Victoria, in 1961.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 1:18 pm
By the way, CL, I’ll make a genuine, non snarky recommendation to you.

Have you seen the UK comedy series Rev. that’s been running at around 10 pm on Sunday nights on ABC1?

I have been forgetting to watch it often because of the odd time slot, but the few episodes I have seen have been pretty funny and, I would guess, an accurate reflection on the state of the Anglican Church.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 1:22 pm
The AFR is back – two great minds, La Tingle and Phabulous Phil, together at last!

H B Bear

12 Mar 13 at 1:23 pm
Much hilarity as a Washington Post-commissioned ‘poll’ finds Catholics don’t want any changes to Church’s traditional (and un-changeable) doctrine.

Humiliated WaPo tries to save face with ‘contradictory’ spin:

Poll: Majority of U.S. Catholics favor change.

The seemingly contradictory results reflect a schism between regular churchgoers and those who attend church less frequently. Catholics who go nearly weekly are more likely to say they want the new pope to maintain traditions. Those who go less frequently are more apt to favor change.

So there you have it. Actual practising Catholics do not ‘favour change.’

Birth certificate ‘Catholics’ do.

LOL.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 1:24 pm
When Julia Gillard was sacked by Slater and Gordon in 1995, her AWU file was passed to Nicola Roxon at Maurice Blackburn.

In November last year, Gillard used parliamentary privilege to defame Michael Smith, who has an extensive file of evidence on how Gillard, among other things, misled the WA Corporate Affairs Commissioner.

A citizen defamed in parliament has a constitutional right of reply.

Speaker Anna Burke has referred a complaint by Smith about Gillard’s defamation to the Parliamentary Privileges Committee.

When Roxon resigned as Attorney-General in February, Gillard appointed her chair of the PPC.

The PPC met a week after Burke referred Smith’s complaint to it, but it did not consider Smith’s complaint and Roxon denied having received it.

Listen here to Smith’s interview this morning on 2GB.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 1:24 pm
Stepford

I hardly ever buy into these sorts of discussions, but CL is right. You really are an evil fucker.

Collins did suggest pell wasn’t exonerated. He seems to be in some trouble and I hope pell sues their fucking arses.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 1:25 pm
The man is without question the worst fascist ever to be elected to federal parliament.

Running neck and neck with that disgusting harridan, roxon, I’d say.

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 1:28 pm
If the original version has been amended, it would indicate that SMH is worried that it may be defamatory.

I can’t see that it would ever be a good look for a Cardinal to be suing for defamation, though.

I think Pell’s reaction, as with the “what the Church needs is a tough Pope to knock some heads together” comments he made to the media (I am mildly paraphrasing) indicates to me that he did badly want the job.

Again, I don’t think that is all that good a look.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 1:37 pm
My understanding was that Pell was never, and will never be, in the running. Always struck me as a formidable guy.

wreckage

12 Mar 13 at 1:40 pm
Running neck and neck with that disgusting harridan, roxon, I’d say.

It does appear to be a close run thing. With that said, none of the Coalition should be getting any ideas to do the same and we all know there are those among them who think that way.

tbh

12 Mar 13 at 1:43 pm
Yea getting accused of child molestation shouldn’t prompt someone to sue the false accuser.

It’s not a good look says Stepford.

It’s also not a good look to have ambition. As a househusband I can see where you’re coming from on that one, Stepford.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 1:45 pm
While on the subject of oxygen thieves. Whatever happened to fatboyas I haven’t seen around these parts anymore.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 1:48 pm
Yes wreckage, I agree. I don’t think Pell has been all that popular for quite a while amongst Australia clergy, let alone liberal laity.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 1:49 pm
While on the subject of oxygen thieves. Whatever happened to fatboy*

We’ve been burdened with grampa syphilis spudpeeler instead.

Not what I’d call a win-win.

*Have you checked lavatory rodeo?

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 1:52 pm
So…Steve has his “conservative catholic” hat on again today.

twostix

12 Mar 13 at 1:52 pm
Have you checked lavatory rodeo?

Twice. It’s disgusting. Tig Tog, the sustainable roof gardener was there.
So was babble mouth Fran Barlow.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 1:55 pm
let alone liberal laity.

LOL – who gives a rodent’s what they think, FFS?

And if you’re a self described “Conservative Catholic” shouldn’t you be a fan of the Pell?

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 1:55 pm
the sustainable roof gardener

What the F*ck?

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 1:56 pm
So…Steve has his “conservative catholic” hat on again today.

Yea. Looks like a clown hat.

Notice how he has a problem with men having ambition?

He posted that in between filling filling the washing machine and cleaning the toilets.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 1:58 pm
I can’t see that it would ever be a good look for a Cardinal to be suing for defamation, though.

You catatonically stupid know-nothing clown.

It is not a good look for a “newspaper” group to give oxygen to a feral axe-grinder to defame a candidate for the Roman Catholic Papacy.

Fuck. Me. Dead.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 1:59 pm
Stepford

I hardly ever buy into these sorts of discussions, but CL is right. You really are an evil fucker.

SFB would sell his arse if it meant he got attention here.

Gab

12 Mar 13 at 2:02 pm
Rabz

There was once a pic of tig tog sitting on her roof showing off a pumpkin patch. It was in the Age.

No kidding, she had fucking pumpkins growing on a corregated roof and she was smiling at the camera.

The pic and blurb suggested it was another example of sustainable living.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 2:02 pm
liar-steve™ is aa stomach-churning contemptible creep but he gets his jollies from the reaction.

Belittle his twittery but never otherwise engage.

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 2:03 pm
There was once a pic of tig tog sitting on her roof showing off a pumpkin patch.

A vegetable growing vegetables – no wonder the Yaged was beside itself.

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 2:04 pm
Ummm not sure if it’s tigq tog. Is she catherine Wilson?

Anyways Catherine Wilson used to once frequent prodeo drive.

Here’s the Age story and pic

http://www.theage.com.au/news/in-depth/how-green-is-your-roof/2008/03/04/1204402453360.html

She climbed on the roof wearing freaking high heeled boots!

JC

12 Mar 13 at 2:13 pm
Ummm not sure if it’s tig tog. Is she catherine Wilson?

Sorry Squire, I have absolutely no idea who either of those individuals are (thank goodness).

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 2:16 pm
Not watching question time. Need to keep blood pressure down!

Andrew

12 Mar 13 at 2:16 pm
Found at Quadrant… a peer reviewed research paper on Drop Bears!

In the fashion of the latest climate change peer reviewed research.

kae

12 Mar 13 at 2:27 pm
I was thinking while shaving this morning that the Church could probably do with a George III style Pope – one who goes a touch mad and starts proclaiming various odd things as infallible doctrines. That might, depending on how it panned out, lead to a re-assessment of the whole doctrine of infallibility, which wouldn’t be such a bad thing.

I haven’t read Collins or Hans Kung’s books on the topic of infallibility, but I probably should…

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 2:37 pm
Are people aware this site is majorly broken right now and has been for a few days? Some URLs work and others don’t. The root doesn’t work. But once you’re in you can navigate via the right side menu.

Harold

12 Mar 13 at 2:37 pm
Are people aware this site is majorly broken right now and has been for a few days? Some URLs work and others don’t. The root doesn’t work. But once you’re in you can navigate via the right side menu.

I am sure that the site started collapsing after it was announced that LP had re-opened.
Jaques, there is enough circumstantial evidence in my previous statement to warrant closing down LP, it is after all for the greater good.
In fact, if the circumstantial evidence was half as good as this for AGW theory, I reckon I would be a convert.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

12 Mar 13 at 2:43 pm
I was thinking…

Sorry, you lost me just there.

dover_beach

12 Mar 13 at 2:53 pm
Patience Harold. Patience.

JC

12 Mar 13 at 3:00 pm
Stedman has pranged another car.

No worries. Taxpayers will pick up the tab.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 3:03 pm
I was thinking while shaving this morning…

With predictable results.

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 3:06 pm
I was thinking while shaving this morning

Your bikini line?

Infidel Tiger

12 Mar 13 at 3:17 pm
Your bikini line?

Nah, his back.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

12 Mar 13 at 3:30 pm
My back is pretty hairless. I have a photo of part of it I took recently if you want me to email it to you, Chuckelberry.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 3:41 pm
No worries Steve, you can access my email address after you post your picture, along with all of your details here.
Looking forward to it.

Huckleberry Chunkwot

12 Mar 13 at 3:56 pm
If only more people would do as this man does and confront the disgusting drunken sluts that befoul our fair city:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WzKbuDfzmA&feature=player_embedded

Infidel Tiger

12 Mar 13 at 4:10 pm
Reminds me of something in Free to Choose i think
http://www.themoneyillusion.com/?p=19982

Pedro

12 Mar 13 at 4:21 pm
Paul Ryan Op-Ed in the WSJ: The GOP Plan to Balance the Budget by 2023

Our opponents will shout austerity, but let’s put this in perspective. On the current path, we’ll spend $46 trillion over the next 10 years. Under our proposal, we’ll spend $41 trillion. On the current path, spending will increase by 5% each year. Under our proposal, it will increase by 3.4%. Because the U.S. economy will grow faster than spending, the budget will balance by 2023, and debt held by the public will drop to just over half the size of the economy.

Yet the most important question isn’t how we balance the budget. It’s why. A budget is a means to an end, and the end isn’t a neat and tidy spreadsheet. It’s the well-being of all Americans. By giving families stability and protecting them from tax hikes, our budget will promote a healthier economy and help create jobs. Most important, our budget will reignite the American Dream, the idea that anyone can make it in this country.

RTWT

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 4:35 pm
I don’t know what I pity more, those disgusting drunken sluts, or the giggling idiots sitting with the cameraman.

dover_beach

12 Mar 13 at 4:37 pm
Ah, nothing Catallaxy likes better than getting to call women “sluts”.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 4:45 pm
Ah, nothing Catallaxy likes better than

Beer.

wreckage

12 Mar 13 at 4:55 pm
If only more people would do as this man does and confront the disgusting drunken sluts that befoul our fair city:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-WzKbuDfzmA&feature=player_embedded

Right across the road from my local.

Yobbo

12 Mar 13 at 4:55 pm
Right across the road from my local.

Those harlots at Maccas look too young to have got into Botanica.

Infidel Tiger

12 Mar 13 at 4:58 pm
Right across the road from my local.

About 2 minutes from where I work! I’ve also spent many lunch times at Botanica. I watched about 10 seconds of the video and already I wanted somebody to give them all a clip over the ear. Show some fucking respect girls.

tbh

12 Mar 13 at 5:00 pm
Those harlots at Maccas look too young to have got into Botanica.

Showing your age IT.

Steve, have you filled out the form and posted your photo yet?

Huckleberry Chunkwot

12 Mar 13 at 5:00 pm
Mark Steyn: The Panopticon State
Where the government can see, it can send a drone.

As they see it, we have the best technology and the worst will; we choose aerial assassination and its attendant collateral damage because we are risk-averse, and so remote, antiseptic, long-distance, computer-programmed warfare is all that we can bear. Our technological strength betrays our psychological weakness.

And in a certain sense they’re right: Afghanistan is winding down, at best, to join the long list of America’s unwon wars, in which, 48 hours after departure, there will be no trace that we were ever there. The guys with drones are losing to the guys with fertilizer — because they mean it, and we don’t. The drone thus has come to symbolize the central defect of America’s “war on terror,” which is that it’s all means and no end: We’re fighting the symptoms rather than the cause.

For a war without strategic purpose, a drone’ll do. Anwar al-Awlaki, an American citizen born in New Mexico, was whacked by a Predator not on a battlefield but after an apparently convivial lunch at a favorite Yemeni restaurant. Two weeks later, al-Awlaki’s son Abdulrahman was dining on the terrace of another local eatery when the CIA served him the old Hellfire Special and he wound up splattered all over the patio. Abdulrahman was 16, and born in Denver. As I understand it, the Supreme Court has ruled that American minors, convicted of the most heinous crimes, cannot be executed. But you can gaily atomize them halfway round the planet. My brief experience of Yemeni restaurants was not a happy one but, granted that, I couldn’t honestly say they met any recognized definition of a “battlefield.”

Al-Awlaki Junior seems to have been your average anti-American teen. Al-Awlaki Senior was an al-Qaeda ideologue, and a supposed “spiritual mentor” to everyone from the 9/11 murderers to the Fort Hood killer and the thwarted Pantybomber. On the other hand, after September 11, he was invited to lunch at the Pentagon, became the first imam to conduct a prayer service at the U.S. Congress, and was hailed by NPR as an exemplar of an American “Muslim leader who could help build bridges between Islam and the West.” The precise point at which he changed from American bridge-builder to Yemeni-restaurant take-out is hard to determine. His public utterances when he was being feted by the New York Times are far more benign than those of, say, Samira Ibrahim, who was scheduled to receive a “Woman of Courage” award from Michelle Obama and John Kerry on Friday until an unfortunate flap erupted over some ill-phrased Tweets from the courageous lass rejoicing on the anniversary of 9/11 that she loved to see “America burning.” The same bureaucracy that booked Samira Ibrahim for an audience with the first lady and Anwar al-Awlaki to host prayers at the Capitol now assures you that it’s entirely capable of determining who needs to be zapped by a drone between the sea bass and the tiramisu at Ahmed’s Bar and Grill.

As usual RTWT

JamesK

12 Mar 13 at 5:05 pm
Those harlots at Maccas look too young to have got into Botanica.

It’s never mattered how old you are if you’re hot.

Yobbo

12 Mar 13 at 5:07 pm
Ah, nothing Catallaxy likes better than getting to call women “sluts”.

You were banned for the way you spoke to the women here.

If I recall you even told Gab you wanted to hit her once.

twostix

12 Mar 13 at 5:09 pm
I liked it a lot better when it was called The Nookemburra, they had strippers on Friday afternoon, and a middy was $2.50 instead of $7 or whatever they are charging now.

Also, the price of a Hamburger went from $6 to $22.50.

Yobbo

12 Mar 13 at 5:10 pm
Hey d-b, I had forgotten that Pope Pius IX had been beatified, and also forgotten about his personal involvement in the Egardo Mortara case (the Jewish boy kidnapped and raised away from his family because of a claim he had been baptised.)

It’s getting too easy to become “Blessed”, don’t you think?

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 5:13 pm
I liked it a lot better when it was called The Nookemburra, they had strippers on Friday afternoon, and a middy was $2.50 instead of $7 or whatever they are charging now.

The chicks at Botanica are much better looking now, but it costs you a heap more to get their tops off.

Infidel Tiger

12 Mar 13 at 5:16 pm
I’m trying to have a discussion about dubious Papal decisions and infallibility, and everyone else just wants to talk topless women.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 5:19 pm
Nothing dubious about Pope Benedict’s decree that you are Persona non grata here at the cat SfB.

In fact I think he mumbled under his breath something along the lines “Steve’s a cnut”.

Splatacrobat

12 Mar 13 at 5:26 pm
Love Steyn. He has raised the skewering of leftys to an art-form.

H B Bear

12 Mar 13 at 5:31 pm
You are old if you remember the golden age of WA strippers before Carmen Lawrence decided the State did not approve of the use of elderly gentleman’s walking aids as impromptu stage apparatus.

Forget beagle marriage, that really was a slippery slope.

H B Bear

12 Mar 13 at 5:39 pm
I remember going to a strip show at a pub in Mt Tom Price in the mid 80′s and the local coppers were on the door collecting the cover charge. Yes HB they were the golden years.

Splatacrobat

12 Mar 13 at 5:47 pm
You are old if you remember the golden age of WA strippers before Carmen Lawrence decided the State did not approve of the use of elderly gentleman’s walking aids as impromptu stage apparatus.

I was barely old enough to know what this was all about and Pam Beggs shut it down! More is the pity I say.

tbh

12 Mar 13 at 5:59 pm
Since the subject of topless women has again been raised in this august forum, permit me to add my observation that size really doesn’t matter. All those women who might be made to feel less than fulsome, be assured.
Shape can be distracting, but really, it comes back to being … centered. That’s the bit that rises to the occasion, and for perhaps a significant reason is the one small bit that’s covered when all the surrounding fleshy acres are not. Even when only by contra-rotating tassles!

blogstrop

12 Mar 13 at 6:05 pm
The same bureaucracy that booked Samira Ibrahim for an audience with the first lady and Anwar al-Awlaki to host prayers at the Capitol now assures you that it’s entirely capable of determining who needs to be zapped by a drone between the sea bass and the tiramisu at Ahmed’s Bar and Grill.

Not very often I disagree with Steyn. Here I do.

jupes

12 Mar 13 at 6:21 pm
Topless bargirl’s fight over frozen assets

She has a point, or two.

Keith

12 Mar 13 at 6:26 pm
Not very often I disagree with Steyn. Here I do.

Yeah – sea bass followed by tiramisu ?

Sounds like a night on the antacids lies ahead.

Myrrdin Seren

12 Mar 13 at 6:27 pm
The results of the Falkland Islands referendum are 1,513 yes votes and three no votes. a yes vote of 99.80%. pity the three that voted no.

a free election voting 99.8% for anything?

58 precints in america recorded no votes to Mitt; some rural areas of Utah recording no votes for obama. lopsided free elections are possible

Jim Rose

12 Mar 13 at 6:28 pm
I’m trying to have a discussion about dubious Papal decisions and infallibility, and everyone else just wants to talk topless women.

Hey, look at me, look at me, look at me!!! I’m a troll, I’m a troll, I’m a troll. I don’t tolerate trolling for a second at my pathetic website. Neither do any of the fascist left websites I love. But here I can throw shit in the faces of the blog owners to my heart’s content because of their high-minded aversion to censorship. LOOK AT ME TROLLING!!! It’s the only way I can get attention from people who despise me.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 6:35 pm
Pam Beggs shut it down!

I forgot all about that Roxonian slapper.

Infidel Tiger

12 Mar 13 at 6:44 pm
Philippa Martyr, if you’re lurking, thanks for the splendid read on the WA election at Quadrant, particularly the excellent analysis of the defeat of Kim Beasley’s kid, who had thought it would be a cakewalk. Unfortunately, access to commenting at your blog is protected like the Berlin wall.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 6:47 pm
Not as good as some of your previous conniptions, Tom.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 7:01 pm
I forgot all about that Roxonian slapper.

Before Roxon came onto the scene it was between Beggs and Brian Harradine in the competition for the biggest wowser in Australia, I reckon.

tbh

12 Mar 13 at 7:04 pm
I looked up Beazley’s resume on Linked In, which I recommend you do too. She finished high school in 1996, and there’s a gap of four years, and then in 2000 she enrolled in a BA (Arts Management) at the WA Academy of Performing Arts at Edith Cowan University. When Beazley completed her degree, she went straight into a position as Policy Advisor, Social Policy Division for the Department of Premier & Cabinet under Geoff Gallop’s ALP state government.

Jesus H Christ, these people are shameless

Yobbo

12 Mar 13 at 7:23 pm
Buzz off stepford. Go on shoo off.

Frank walker from National Tiles

12 Mar 13 at 7:23 pm
Jesus H Christ, these people are shameless

Yeah, and it just never, ever happens under Coalition governments:

Newman neither advertised the position, nor wrote selection criteria, nor compared Caltabiano’s credentials with other potential candidates. We just don’t know if that $400,000-plus will be spent each year on the best possible person.

We just have to take Newman at his word that Caltabiano’s appointment had nothing to do with his background as an LNP Brisbane City councillor, LNP state MP and LNP state president.

Caltabiano has since gone, although he got 20 weeks pay for doing nothing.

And his also now gone Arts Minister Ros Bates:

Ms Bates resigned after months of criticism for alleged nepotism, her contact with lobbyists and the amount of leave she’s taken.

On Saturday morning, it was revealed her close friend Kaye Martin was awarded a department contract and appointed to a board position with Screen Queensland.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 7:33 pm
Not as good as some of your previous conniptions, Tom.

But it’s still good because it’s true. He’s bang on the money.

Oh come on

12 Mar 13 at 7:33 pm
Well, here we go again, people.

Melbourne has just had about five days of warm weather, culminating in a forty degree day today.

So yes, get ready for the usual bleating bedwetters here and in the meeja to start screeching “but it’s not the normal kind of hot, I tells ya!”.

No, it’s just fucking weather, you stupid, tiresome dick heads.

Get over it.

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 7:46 pm
Newman neither advertised the position, nor wrote selection criteria, nor compared Caltabiano’s credentials with other potential candidates.

How is that even remotely the same thing Steve?

Caltabiano had 10 years experience as a civil engineer and 10 years on the Brisbane City Council to bring to the table.

Beazley’s daughter was a fresh graduate from a nothing course at WA’s least respected university who had never held a job.

Yobbo

12 Mar 13 at 7:55 pm
It only got to 36, Rabz, but you’re right, the hysterics are in hysterics. They can smell the funding cold front coming in September. Today was the last hot day ’til December.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 7:56 pm
The coal seam gas argument here continues to roll along (ABC News Talking Point ad nauseum) with none of the beloved “science” ingredient so often invoked by warmists. How are such emotional presentations being sold to the viewers with no examination of the actual methods employed to isolate the gas well from any surrounding geological strata?
In America, it’s called “shale gas”. Drilling there, as described in an interview at the estimable Hoover Institute site called “Uncommon Knowledge”, hosted by Peter Robinson, involves concreting the walls of the wells to ensure there’s no mix of the water table – which occupies shallow levels only – with the rising gas produced by the fracking at far greater depths.
We can have no sensible discussion until the methods used here are detailed. But that’s never stopped the “environmentalists” from running a course of agitprop with the willing connivance of the leftist media.

blogstrop

12 Mar 13 at 8:02 pm
Oh OK, Yobbo, it would be more like Ros Bates’ son aged 25 getting a $100,000 job?

It follows claims Ben Gommers, 25, has been given a car space in a prime Brisbane CBD location, despite not being a typical perk for a temporary departmental liaison officer at the Department of Transport and Main Roads.

It’s understood Mr Gommers was hired on May 10 on a contract that would expire on May 24 next year with an A08 salary level, meaning he would earn up to $103,000.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 8:04 pm
SfB QC, are you still reporting to the police once a year and every time you change address, motor vehicle, employment or Internet service provider?

Tiny Dancer

12 Mar 13 at 8:06 pm
I’m trying to have a discussion…

No, you’re not, Dogshit. You’re a two-bob troll. Fuck off.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 8:10 pm
Roy Morgan poll 57.5 LNP to 42.5 ALP. Sample= 4500 ppl

Andrew

12 Mar 13 at 8:26 pm
The bigger the sample, the worse it gets for the rabble.

Tom

12 Mar 13 at 8:29 pm
Morgan Poll – lovely numbers

Mike of Marion

12 Mar 13 at 8:34 pm
Newspoll looking like the odd poll out again.

Andrew

12 Mar 13 at 8:43 pm
More from that Steyn link:

America takes an ever more expansive view of police power, and, while the notion of unmanned drones patrolling the heartland may seem absurd, lots of things that seemed absurd a mere 15 years ago are now a routine feature of life. Not so long ago, it would have seemed not just absurd but repugnant and un-American to suggest that the state ought to have the power to fondle the crotch of a seven-year-old boy without probable cause before permitting him to board an airplane. Yet it happened, and became accepted, and is unlikely ever to be reversed.

Americans now accept the right of minor bureaucrats to collect all kinds of information for vast computerized federal databases, from answers on gun ownership for centralized “medical records” to answers on “dwelling arrangements” for nationalized “education records.” With paperwork comes regulation, and with regulation comes enforcement. We have advanced from the paramilitarization of the police to the paramilitarization of the Bureau of Form-Filling. Two years ago in this space, I noted that the U.S. secretary of education, who doesn’t employ a single teacher, is the only education minister in the developed world with his own SWAT team: He used it to send 15 officers to kick down a door in Stockton, Calif., drag Kenneth Wright out onto the front lawn, and put him in handcuffs for six hours. Erroneously, as it turned out. But it was in connection with his estranged wife’s suspected fraudulent student-loan application, so you can’t be too careful. That the education bureaucracy of the Brokest Nation in History has its own Seal Team Six is ridiculous and offensive. Yet the citizenry don’t find it so: They accept it.

And that, my friends, sums up why America is finished – unless another revolution seeds the grounds of liberty with the blood of tyrants.

C.L.

12 Mar 13 at 8:44 pm
Sam, what are your thoughts on the mummy bloggers?

Tal

12 Mar 13 at 8:46 pm
“So yes, get ready for the usual bleating bedwetters here and in the meeja to start screeching “but it’s not the normal kind of hot, I tells ya!”.”

Rabz, confronted with the first 9-day run of 30-degree-plus days since records began in 1856, sticks his fingers in his ears and yells “It’s normal, it’s normal! Because shuddup!”

Jarrah

12 Mar 13 at 10:08 pm
Love Steyn. He has raised the skewering of leftys to an art-form.
Judging from the discussion on the “drones” thread, Abu will brand him a mangina for having qualms about killing Al-Awlaki Junior. Unlike the Labor party, it’s not always a case of “whatever it takes”.

Cold-Hands

12 Mar 13 at 10:15 pm
And that, my friends, sums up why America is finished – unless another revolution seeds the grounds of liberty with the blood of tyrants.

So in Mk50′s absence, CL steps up to the plate to do a bit of lip smacking anticipation at a paranoid wingnut armed uprising.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 10:17 pm
Records are not normal, who knew?

dover_beach

12 Mar 13 at 10:28 pm
So in Mk50′s absence, CL steps up to the plate to do a bit of lip smacking anticipation at a paranoid wingnut armed uprising.

That right there is about as fucked up a thing as you have ever said.

wreckage

12 Mar 13 at 10:40 pm
I can’t quite tell what you’re upset about wreckage.

CL’s statement is hard to read other than as a welcoming as a corrective to that (alleged) appalling state of the country.

You agree that’s the only hope for the place?

I have previously criticised Mk50 for his similar comments in which he also talked up military and ex military wingnuts who have crapping on about taking on the government if they dare restrict assault weapons (like, yeah, the country became a fascist state last time that happened) and their “right” to 50 round magazines.

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 10:52 pm
a welcoming of a revolution…

steve from brisbane

12 Mar 13 at 10:53 pm
“Records are not normal, who knew?”

Rabz didn’t. He worked himself up into a spitting rage that I would even have the audacity to point out record-breaking events are, by definition, not the normal state of affairs. He now perversely brings up his self-beclowning at every opportunity, like a dog going back to his vomit.

Jarrah

12 Mar 13 at 10:54 pm
Why the rush? Why is Conroy forcing this through?

LABOR hopes to ram through its proposed media reforms, including a public interest test and stronger industry self-regulation, within the next two sitting weeks.

Communications Minister Stephen Conroy announced on Tuesday the federal government’s long awaited response to the reports of two long-run independent media inquiries handed to it in early 2012.

But opposition communications spokesman Malcolm Turnbull says its reply was a “chaotic, half-baked” plan and took issue with the public interest test proposal.

Overall, the government’s response avoided many of the wide-ranging recommendations that came out of the convergence review and the Finkelstein inquiry into press regulation.

Among the key reforms are changes to broadcast ownership rules, beefed-up oversight of print and online news media and cuts to television network licence fees.

“These reforms will ensure for the Australian public a media sector that is fair, diverse and able to tackle the challenges of the future,” Senator Conroy told reporters in Canberra.

The minister said the government was addressing community concerns about media quality and how press complaints were handled.

A separate bill deals with a previously announced 50 per cent licence fee rebate for television stations, in return for increased local content.

The bills require the support of crossbench MPs and the Australian Greens, and already appear to have the backing of most of the independents.

Please, the Greens are frothing at the mouth to get this bill passed.

Read more: http://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/national/labor-unveils-media-industry-changes/story-e6frfku9-1226595640825#ixzz2NKFIwJ1j

Gab

12 Mar 13 at 10:54 pm
Point proven.

Bleating, bedwetting dickhead at 10:08.

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 10:55 pm
Sam, what are your thoughts on the mummy bloggers?

Not sure what Sam thinks but apparently Tim Mathieson was overheard complaining at the NRL match on Sunday that three of them were “frigid bitches” and the other two were “dud roots”

Leigh Lowe

12 Mar 13 at 10:57 pm
And 10:54.

You fact and evidence free clown. You’re the fucking moron who made the patently absurd claim that normal weather isn’t. Being the hysterical bedwetter that you are.

Don’t like being reminded of that piece of fucking idiocy, do you?

I’m not surprised.

Rabz

12 Mar 13 at 11:00 pm
Tim Mathieson was overheard complaining at the NRL match on Sunday that three of them were “frigid bitches” and the other two were “dud roots”

Pot and Kettle

Tintarella di Luna

12 Mar 13 at 11:00 pm
“You’re the fucking moron who made the patently absurd claim that normal weather isn’t.”

Don’t try that revisionist shit, Rabz. You’re the “fucking moron” who made the patently absurd claim that abnormal weather wasn’t. Being the involuntarily single public servant that you are.

Jarrah

13 Mar 13 at 1:49 am

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